RAND,  MCNALLY  &  O's 


NEW 


OVERLAND  GUIDE 


PACIFIC   COAST. 


CALIFORNIA, 


ARIZONA,    NEW    MEXICO,    COLORADO 
AND    KANSAS. 


BY    JAMES    W .    S T E E L E . 


CHICAGO  : 

RAND,  MCNALLY  &  COMPANY,  PUBLISHERS. 

148,   150,  152  AND   154  MONROE  STREET,    and 
323  BROADWAY,  NEW  YORK. 
1888. 


*    Am«*uw«iWft 

Lies  immediately  West  of  the  State  line  dividing  Kansas  and  Missouri. 


The 


CittJ 


ARMOUR,  FOWLER,  KINGAN,  SWIFT, « 

* MORRIS  *  BUTTS,  AND  ALCUTT 


HOUSES. 

The  Union  Pacific  and  Missouri  Pacific  Pail  road  Shops,    and  a   host  of  smaller 
Manufactories  and  Shops. 

Is  growing  more  rapidly  than  any  City  in  the  State.   Will  very  soon  be 

the  Largest  City.  Numerically,  as  it  is  now  in  importance, 

in  Kansas.      Has  in   operation   the   only 

ELEVATED  ROAD 

Outside  of  New  York  City,  a  first  class  Cable  Road,  with  several  more  in 
course  of  construction.    For  Safe.  Secure  and 

XPROFITABLE  •  INVESTMENTS* 

There  can  be  no  equal  to  the  opportunities  afforded  in' 

CITY, 


JAMES  D.  HUSXE3D, 

REAL  ESTATE  DEALER 

1st  National  Bank  Building, 

KANSAS   CITY,   KANSAS. 


American  Bank  Building, 


KANSAS  CITY,  MO 


Copyright,  1888,  by  Rand,  McNally  I 


60NTENTS. 


I'Ai.K 

PREFACE 3-5 

THE  JofKNF.v  -. 

is  City — Scenes  at  Union  Depot — The  City's  History  and 
Peculiar  Features— Westport  Landing — The  Trail — Growth  and 
Trade  of  Kansas  City — Railroads,  etc 7~i? 

-AS  : 

Some  Statistics — The  Pawnees — The  Raws — Historical  Notes — The 
Arkansas  Valle) — First  Male  White  Child  Born  in  the  State — The  State 
University — Lawrence — Topeka — Some  Reminiscences —  Emporia — 
Climatic  Changes,  etc. !8~47 

COLOR 

History — Topography — Bent's  Fort — The  Indians — Trinidad — Raton 

Tunnel — Mountain  Scenery  and  Health  Resorts — The  Staked  Plain.  .        48-64 

PAX-HANDLE  or  TKXA-: 

Location  and  Peculiarities — The  Cattle  Baron — His  Anomalous  and 
Lawless  Position — The  Cowboy 65-70 

Ni.w   Mi  xico  : 

Its  Antiquity — Still  Full  of  Ancient  and  Picturesque  Nooks — A  Land 
of  Health  Resorts,  Beautiful  Valleys,  and  Lofty  Mountains — Descrip- 
tion of  the  Territory — Topography — History — Some  of  Its  Native 
Inhabitants — The  Pueblos — Silent  Ruins — Raton — Las  Vegas — 
Glorieta  Pass — Old  Pecos  Church — Apache  Cafion — Starvation  Peak 
— Albuquerque — Laguna — La  Mesa  Encantada 71-100 

ARIZONA  : 

Its  Magnitude — Undeveloped  Wealth — Desolate  Appearance — The 
Mojave  Desert— Water- Worn  Rocks — The  Sand-Blast — W'ingate — 
Navajo  Church — Rio  Pucrco  Valley — Isolated  Rocks — Holbrook — 
Flagstaff  —  The  Cliff  Dwellings— Petrified  Forests  —  The  Natural 
Bridge— The  Painted  Desert— Grand  Canon  of  the  Colorado— The 
Needles 101-126 

CALIFORNIA  : 

The  Entrance  to  the  State  Dismal  and  Uninviting — Barstow — Topog- 
raphy and  Climate — Valleys  and  Mountains 127-143 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

<ERN  CALIFORNIA  :  PAGE 

~t  and  Present — Equable  Temperature — History  of  Its  Discovery 
and  Occupancy —Annexation  to  the  United  States — The  Colorado 
Desert — The  Valleys  of  San  Gabriel  and  San  Bernardino — What  Irri- 
gation Does  for  the  Soil — The  Charm  that  Hovers  Over  the  Country 
—A  Land  for  the  Wealthy,  the  Indolent,  and  the  Sick — The  Poor 
Man  Has  No  Business  There 144-167 

CLIMA 

Variations  of  Climate  Governed  by  Topographical  Features — Warm 
and  Cool  Nights — The  Californian  Climatic  Puzzle — Tables  of 
Comparisons  and  Mean  Temperatures — Causes  of  California's  many 
Variations  of  Climate — Effects  of  Altitude  and  Configuration  upon  the 
Climates  of  the  smaller  Valleys i '  - 

IN  GENLKAI.  : 

The  Mojave  River  and  Cajon  Pass — Routes  through  California— The 
Yosemite  Valley  and  the  Big  Tree  Groves — Th»  Sequoia  the  Last  of 
the  Race  of  Giant  Trees — Peculiarities  in  the  Flora  and  Farna  of  the 
Pacific  Coast — Absence  of  Eastern  Varieties  of  Plants  and  Animals — 
The  Tarantula,  the  Mosquito  and  the  Flea — Scorpions — Snakes 183-192 

ASA  HKALTH  KK»«.>I.  193-196 

APPENDIX. 

ITINEI. 

From  Kansas  City  to  Los  Angeles,  San  Diego,  or  San  Francisco 197-198 

SrANi.su  GEOGRAPHICAL  NAMES 199-212 


PREFACE. 


JlftHIS   GUIDE  is  intended  for 


1 


the  convenience  of  those  per- 


sons who,  wishing  to  make  a  jour- 
ney to  California,  find  their  most 
convenient  route  to  lie  through 
Kansas  City. 

Such  persons  would  live  as  far 
south  as  Memphis,  for  instance,  and 
as  far  north  as  Chicago.  There 
are  many  thousands  of  these  annu- 
ally; for  California,  and  especially 
Southern  California,  seems  to  have 
become  a  subject  in  which  a  great 
portion  of  the  American  people 
are  interested.  Why  this  is  so  may 
in  some  measure  appear  in  the 
following  pages.  There  is  no  country  whose  history  is  more  curious  or  whose 
changes  have  been  more  astonishing.  Simply  as  a  study;  as  a  chapter  out  of  mod- 
ern American  history;  as  an  example  of  the  results  wrought  by  steam,  water  and 
human  industry, — California,  upper,  middle  or  southern,  is  worth  some  attention, 
if  not  very  careful  consideration. 

This  narrative  will  also  include  a  glance,  as  careful  as  space  will  admit  of,  of 
what  lies  between; — Kansas,  Colorado,  New  Mexico,  and  Arizona.  All  these  that 
have  not  already  come  to  the  front  in  public  estimation  are  rapidly  coming,  and  all 
are  interested  from  at  least  one  standpoint ; — that  which  regards  them  as  the  seat  of 
future  empire,  the  homes  of  countless  thousands  of  people  who  will  be  all  Ameri- 
cans, all  speaking  the  same  language,  wearing  the  same  dress,  following  the  same 
customs,  and  under  whose  touch  every  desert  will  yet  bloom,  every  mountain  nook 
become  a  home. 

There  are  many  trans  Continental  lines.  They  all  offer  their  attractions  and 
advantages.  But  the  tide  of  travel  has  for  the  past  year  or  two  sought  the  most 

(3) 


4  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

direct  li  ard,  and  the  shortest  is  the  one  whose  features  are  of  the  most 

interest  to  the  average  traveler,  other  things  being  equal,  and  that  is  the  route 
described  in  the  following  pages,  so  far,  at  least,  as  to  Southern  California.  A  guide 
of  travel  that  attempts  a  description  of  all  possible  routes  at  once,  jumps  here  and 
there  without  sequence  or  order,  confusing  the  reader,  to  whom  time-tables  are 
always  accessible,  and  adding  liule  or  nothing  to  the  interest  of  any  one  route. 

Nearly  all  guide-books  are  so  made,  and  nearly  all  are,  in  this  regard  at  least, 
unsatisfactory.  An  attempt  is  here  made  to  depart  from  this  ancient  plan,  and  to 
give  the  reader  a  consecutive  story,  from  day  to  day,  of  at  least  one  route.  It  is 
not  an  advertisement,  but  is  printed  and  sold  for  the  usual  publisher's  reasons.  The 
first  editions  have  offered  encouragement  for  the  project  of  not  only  reprinting  it, 
but  re  writing  it.  The  changes  of  two  years  have  been  like  those  of  a  fairy  tale,  and 
an  attempt  will  be  made  in  these  pages  to  overtake  them. 

But  this  is  a  journey  over  mountain  and  plain,  over  granite,  lava  and  sage,  through 
a  country  which  changes  in  its  industrial  features  almost  under  the  traveler's  eye. 
It  crosses  mountain  ranges  almost  incomparable  in  beauty  and  vastness,  and  wide 
plains,  where  the  rim  of  the  horizon  is  but  a  pale  mist  against  the  arching  sk 
includes  the  homes  of  a  civilization  older  than  any  American  history,  yet  where  the 
original  inhabitants  still  live  and  toil,  and  it  traverses  the  still  plainly  visible  re- 
mains of  a  civilization  yet  older  far,  at  which  modern  science  and  investigation  make 
only  plausible  guesses  and  derive  only  possible  inferences.  Specimens  of  the  races 
that  the  lapse  of  time  has  not  affected,  and  whose  ideas  and  ancestry  are  alike 
prehistoric,  gaze  listle^  and  your  train  as  you  pass  by.  The  m 

appreciative  traveler,  making  this  journey  for  the  first  time,  must  at  least  perceive 
that  he  is  under  stran^r  I  here  are  new  sensations.  There  is  a  foreign  feel- 

ing.    Some  effort  nee  oneself  that  this  is  still  the  domain  over 

which  floats  the  familiar  flag;  that  it  is  still  an  integral  part  of  the  mightiest  empire 
the  world  has  ever  seen. 

A  long  journey  by  rail  is  usually  only  a  respectable  mode  of  solitary  confine- 
ment for  as  long  as  it  lasts.  There  are  only  glimpses  caught  of  the  country  by 
daylight,  and  one  grows  tired  because  he  dots  not  know  anything  of  the  history, 
traditions  or  industries  of  the  country  he  is  traversing.  He  does  not  know  what  to 
look  for,  and  all  his  information  must  usually  be  obtained  from  what  is  termed  a 
"  folder";  a  monotonous  list  of  stations  and  distances  that  does  not  even  name  the 
country  in  which  one  may  chance  to  be. 

Otherwise  he  must  obtain  information  from  some  other  form  of  railway  adver- 
tising, and  in  this  he  puts  so  many  grains  of  salt  that  he  may  usually  be  said  not 
to  believe  it  at  all. 


PREFACE.  5 

Though  no  guide  was  ever  more  than  partially  successful  ;  though  all  items  of 
interest  can  not  be  included;  this  little  volume  is  intended,  as  far  as  possible,  to 
cover  these  deficiencies.  It  covers  a  long  distance,  and  ends  at  last  upon  the  shores 
of  that  boundless  waste  of  waters  that,  to  one  accustomed  to  seeing  the  ocean  face 
him  the  other  way,  seems  the  end  of  all  things. 

It  ends  in  a  country  that  is  as  yet  an  enigma  to  itself.  Southern  California  is  an 
Eden  that  has  sprung  up  out  of  a  soil  that  looks  like  concrete,  and  that  fifteen  years 
ac;o  was  one  of  the  most  hopeless  of  the  foreordained  and  irredeemable  deserts. 
One  can  not  believe,  amid  the  scenes  that  lie  around  its  gateway,  that  nestled  here  is 
the  garden  of  the  United  States;  that  it  is-Summer  all  the  year;  where  roses  and 
castor-beans  alike  take  upon  themselves  the  similitude  of  trees,  ami  where  the  fruits 
and  flowers  of  tropical  islands,  and  curious  perennials  from  across  the  seas,  flourish 
better  than  at  home. 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


HE    J0URNEY. 


!HE  beginning  is  at  a  place  worth  more  than  a  casual  mention. 
KANSAS  CITY  is  one  of  the  towns  that  began  in  time,  and 
established  a  Union  depot.  For  some  years  now,  and  since 
the  tide  of  immigration  began  in  earnest,  this  has  been  almost  a 
depot  for  the  Union.  The  crowds  that  have  of  late  years  gone  out 
to  people  that  God-forsaken  desert  which  now  produces  its  hundreds 
of  thousands  of  bushels  of  wheat  and  corn,  have  mostly  come  stream- 
ing through  the  narrow  gateway  of  the  Union  depot  at  Kansas 
City. 

Every  traveler  now  sees  this  celebrated  spot  at  its  best,  if  its  best 
is  when  it  is  liveliest.  Two  or  three  times  every  day,  for  two  hours 
at  a  time,  it  is  Pandemonium  of  a  rather  pleasing  type.  There  is. 
a  vast  crowd  that  is  mostly  American,  with  a  sprinkling  of  every 
nationality.  Waiting-rooms  for  both  sexes  are  full,  and  a  small 
army  of  both  sexes  and  all  ages  is  marching  back  and  forth  outside. 
It  is  a  human  ant-hill.  Everybody  is  on  business  of  a  puzzling 
kind.  They  are  all  away  from  home,  hundreds  of  them  for  the  first 
time,  and  unfamiliar  with  the  great  how-to-do-it  in  the  way  of  tickets, 
trunks,  trains,  direction,  distance,  locality  and  time.  Counter  res- 
taurants are  confronted  by  hungry  rows,. some  of  the  people  having 
on  overcoats,  and  some  linen  dusters,  thus  showing  their  various. 


8  OVERLAND  GUI  I'M. 

conceptions  of  climate,  and  the  wide-apart  localities  from  whence 
they  have  come. 

There  is  an  expression  of  resignation  on  the  faces  of  some,  of  per- 
fect weariness  on  the  countenances  of  others,  and  of  uncertainty  in 
the  demeanor  of  most.  For  a  dozen  trains  are  making  up.  Long 
•  <f  cars  stand  waiting,  so  arranged  as  to  be  all  accessible,  and 
into  these  the  crowd  is  slowly  percolating.  Policemen  in  gray, 
armed  with  patience  and  an  unusual  fund  of  information  instead  of 
clubs,  are  kept  very  busy.  The  trains  are  all  headed  to  the  East  or 
to  the  West ;  the  one  with  its  headlight  toward  the  setting  sun,  the 
other  looking  back  toward  where  most  of  this  company  came  from, 
and  where  many  a  homesick  one  doubtless  wishes  he  was  again. 

This  scene  changes  daily  in  a  certain  sense,  for  if  you  come  again 
to-morrow  at  the  same  hour  you  will  see  the  same  crowds,  the  same 
hurrying,  anxious  throng,  but  not  a  single  person  you  ever  saw 
before.  They  will  have  passed  hence  as  entirely  and  completely  as 
though  yesterday  were  a  quarter  o£  a  cent  :ry  ago.  They  are  gone 
toward  the  four  winds,  and  will  never  come  again.  It  is  a  daily 
gathering  of  that  innumerable  and  various  company  whose  fixed 
purpose  is  a  new  home.  Old  places  and  associations  have  seen 
them  for  the  last  time.  The  great  country  to  the  westward  swallows 
them  up.  It  evei.  in  a  great  measure  changes  their  characters.  It 
moulds  their  interests,  tastes,  hopes  and  inclinations.  It  makes 
them  forget  all  they  have  deemed  most  worthy  of  remembrance,  and 
teaches  them  new  themes.  The  gigantic  growth  of  beech  or  oak  to 
which  they  have  been  accustomed  is  exchanged  for  the  treeless 
prairie  where  the  nodding  yellow  sunflower  is  the  highest  growth,  and 
they  are  not  astonished.  A  quiet  country  neighborhood  or  little 
town,  where  every  man  knew  the  genealogy  of  every  other,  and 
there  has  been  no  change  within  memory,  is  given  away  forever  for  a 
land  of  booms  and  beginnings,  and  there  is  no  surprise.  This  power 
of  the  far  West  to  educate  people  is  one  of  the  curious  things.  To 
the  old  time  westerner  it  invests  this  crowd  with  a  peculiar  interest. 


KANSAS  CITY.  0 

Illinois  and  Indiana,  Michigan  and  Pennsylvania,  have  lost  these 
men  and  women  as  irrevocably  as  if  they  were  dead.  They  will 
soon  cease  even  to  talk  about  the  old  homes.  It  is  true  ; — they  will 
not  come  back. 

It  may  be  at  ten  o'clock  in  the  morning,  or  the  same  hour  at  night. 
In  either  case  Kansas  City — the  city  itself — is  invisible.  It  is  a  queer 
spot  in  which  to  build  a  town,  and,  like  all  other  cities  of  importance,  it 
was  not  built — it  grew.  The  fate  that  makes  them  does  not  wait 
upon  the  intentions  and  th^  designs  of  men.  It  is  a  place  of  steep 
river  bluffs.  It  is  all  up-and-down.  Some  of  the  principal  streets  have 
been  cut  through  high  banks  of  clay,  leaving  houses  perched  airily 
seventy  or  a  hundred  feet  above  the  roadway.  It  is  a  place  where 
cows  used  to  fall  out  of  pasture  and  break  their  necks,  and  where 
one's  door-yard  may  be  as  dangerous  as  the  brink  of  Niagara.  Yet 
it  is  destined  beyond  doubt  to  become,  if  it  be  not  now,  the  com- 
mercial capital  of  a  great  valley. 

Its  beginnings  are  as  of  yesterday.  Within  the  memory  of  many 
of  its  citizens,  it  was  but  Westport  Landing — a  place  where  steam- 
boats pushed  their  noses  into  the  muddy  banks  of  the  Missouri  and 
were  made  fast  to  a  tree.  In  those  days  there  was  one  long,  steep 
road  up  the  bank  to  the  top  of  the  hill,  and  on  the  hill  there  were 
some  dilapidated  warehouses,  a  store  or  two,  and  the  usual  rough 
accompaniments  of  the  Western  trading  and  freighting  post.  All 
this  was  no  longer  ago  than  1855-60.  A  little  later,  Leavenworth  was 
conceded  to  be  the  metropolis,  with  St.  Joseph  as  something  of  a 
rival.  Something  happened  ;  nobody  knows  precisely  what,  per- 
haps ;  and  the  place  began  to  grow.  It  was  the  bridge  over  the  Mis- 
souri ;  it  was  a  caprice  of  the  railroads  ;  it  was  natural  situation. 
Nobody  would  ever  enquire  what  it  was,  but  for  the  wonder  of  a 
phenomenal  growth,  and  they  will  soon  cease  to  enquire  at  all. 

There  is  one  curious  thing.  A  great,  growing,  beef-and-corn  pro- 
ducing State  like  Kansas,  could  not  control  the  destinies  of  any  city 
of  her  preference  on  her  own  soil.  She  has  poured  her  trade  into 


10 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


the  lap  of  a  Missouri  town,  notwithstanding  that  the  two  States- 
have  a  grudge  against  each  other  almost  as  rancorous  as  a  Kentucky 
family  vendetta.  The  town  is  but  just  far  enough  within  the  line  to 
induce  the  belief  that  it  is  a  curious  and  an  unfair  thing  that  a  Kansas- 
made  city  should  stand  on  Missouri  soil.  But  the  inexorable  State 
Line  intervenes  despite  all  sentiment.  The  cause  of  the  feeling 
between  these  two  States  is  a  matter  of  history.  It  belongs  to  that 
time  which  now  seems  so  far  in  the  past;  "before  the  War." 
Descending  through  at  least  one  generation,  it  is  now  but  a  remi- 


Camping  Freighter*. 


niscence.  But  it  is  a  vivid  one.  The  rights  which  the  young  men 
of  Missouri  trampled  in  the  brown  Kansas  dust  have  long  since 
triumphed.  There  are  no  slaves,  and  there  is  no  slave  territory. 
There  is  no  cause  of  quarrel,  yet  for  many  years  Missouri  has  been 
the  bridge  and  Kansas  City  the  gateway,  by  which  more  than  a 
million  people  have  passed  into  Kansas.  That  is  simply  another 
instance  of  a  drift  toward  greatness  for  which  no  adequate  cause  can 
be  assigned.  For  Missouri  herself,  with  all  her  political  offenses 


KANSAS  CITY.  11 

against  her  sister  on  her  head,  is  still  one  of  the  most  splendidly 
equipped  in  natural  resources  of  all  the  galaxy  of  States. 

But  the  old  times  were  the  romantic  and  interesting  ones  for  Kan- 
sas City.  The  stranger  who  visits  the  place,  and  takes  the  pains  to 
ride  up  the  hill,  or  through  it,  on  a  cable  car,  will  see  from  the 
elevation  a  fair  country  of  hill  and  wood.  There  is  nothing  wild  or 
strange  about  it.  It  is  old,  refined,  cultivated.  Let  him  imagine 
these  hills  as  they  were  but  yesterday.  Gaunt  and  long-horned  oxen 
wandering  over  them,  but  lately  released  from  the  yokes  they  had 
worn  over  a  thousand  miles  of  mountain  and  plain  from  a  country 
as  far  and  fabled  as  Cathay.  There  were  men  there  such  as  civil- 
ization does  not  produce,  bronzed,  bearded,  wide-hatted,  swagger- 
ing. They  were  the  typical  frontiersmen  whose  shades  now  linger 
in  song  and  story.  From  every  ravine  and  hill-side  arose  little  thin 
blue  columns  of  camp-fire  smoke.  There  was  whiskey-merriment, 
shouting,  grotesque  dancing,  and  the  popping  of  enormous  whips. 
For  this  lonely  and  most  unprepossessing  river-landing  was  to  these 
men  high  civilization,  [t  was  indeed,  after  all  the  lonely  reaches  of 
Llano  Estacadoj  after  days  of  wind-swept  silence  and  nights  of  watch- 
ing ;  after  the  weary  tramp  through  aland  that  held  no  human  habita- 
tion ;  after  months  of  wandering  where  countless  herds  of  buffalo 
blocked  the  trails  ;  after  hunger  and  thirst  and  Indian-fighting,  a 
full  measure  of  civilization. 

For  Westport  Landing  was  the  beginning  of  one  of  the  great 
"  Trails,"  one  end  of  which  must  of  necessity  be  more  or  less  civil- 
ized after  the  fashion  of  those  days. 

A  "  Trail  "  is  a  curious  thing.  The  word  is  one  of  the  most  com- 
mon in  both  western  and  eastern  literature  now,  and  frequently 
requisite  in  ordinary  conversation.  Yet  it  now  has  a  meaning  so 
far  in  the  past  that  the  first  significance  is  hardly  thought  of. 

It  may  mean,  but  does  not  always,  a  road.  At  first  it  never  did. 
A  trail  was  a  path,  winding  away  crookedly  and  endlessly,  leading 
-somewhere,  but  never  definitely  and  certainly.  Ages  before  America 


1'2  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

discovered  by  Europeans  the  aborigines  of  the  country  had 
paths  through  the  woods  and  swamps,  across  the  plains  and  over 
the  mountain  ranges,  crossing  zones  and  climates,  and  reaching  to 
the  utmost  verge  of  the  land  from  Great  Bear  Lake  to  the  Gulf,  and 
from  the  Atlantic  to  the  Pacific.  The  trails  of  one  region  and  tribe, 
or  confederation  of  tribes,  ran  imperceptibly  into  those  of  another. 
Along  these  paths  the  light  of  thousands  of  camp-fires  was  always 
shining  by  night,  and  silent  files  of  warriors,  one  behind  the  other, 
were  always  passing  like  dusky  ghosts.  There  were  trails  and 
Indians  and  camp-fires  everywhere,  yet  so  far  apart  that  it  would 
almost  seem  that  there  were  none,  and  that  the  vast  continent  was 
not  inhabited. 

Rivers  and  lakes  were  crossed  in  canoes,  and  the  trails  went 
round,  over  or  through  all  natural  difficulties.  There  was  even  a 
kind  of  commerce  in  those  days  without  records,  and  tribe  exchanged 
with  tribe  the  rude  necessities  and  commodities  of  savage  life.  There 
were  vast  regions  where  there  were  no  metals  accessible  ;  yet 
tribe  had  its  armlets  and  nose-rings.  There  were  districts  where 
there  was  no  flint  or  obsidian  for  arrow-heads  ;  yet  all  had  these 
articles  of  prime  necessity.  What  was  not  got  by  exchange  was 
taken  by  theft  or  conquest. 

But  these  were  not  colonists.  They  never  >tayed  :  they  did  not 
acquire,  or  try  to  acquire,  territory.  They  came  and  went,  and  left 
not  a  shred  of  the  history  of  conquest.  It  can  hardly  be  conceived 
of  in  these  days  that  what  was  considered  worth  toil,  wandering  and 
privation  ;  what  was  worth  fighting  and  dying  for  ;  was  not  wort^ 
even  so  much  record  as  a  heap  of  stones.  The  North  American 
Indian  was,  and  still  is,  a  curious  specimen  of  humanity.  Guided 
by  an  instinct  in  wandering  as  unerring  as  that  of  the  wild  goose, 
the  wilderness  remained,  save  for  these  dim  trails,  absolutely  un- 
changed by  their  presence  through  uncounted  centuries. 

It  is  a  very  curious  fact  that  these  trails  ; — at  least  the  principal  and 
main  ones  ; — have  had  a  most  decided  effect  upon  modern  commerce. 


KANSAS  CITY 


The  Original  Trail-Makers 


14 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


They  are  the  commercial  highways  of  the  present.  Starting  from 
Atlantic  coast  the  traveler  will  closely  follow  them  even  to  the 
Pacific  coast.  Wherever  the  railway  lines  cross  the  mountains  the 
track  lies  almost  precisely  in  the  old  paths.  They  were  deepened 
and  worn  by  white  men  who  imitated  the  Indians,  long  before  the 
railroads  took  them  for  the  last  use  that  has  been  found  for  them  in 
these  later  times  when  the  chiefest  consideration  of  life  is  trade  and 
transportation. 

For  the  prehistoric  savage  ;— the  old  Indian  who  lived  and  died 
long  before  he  had  been  dreamed  of  as  a  subject  of  song  or  story, 
or  as  the  owner  of  valuable  lands,  or  as  a  "  ward  of  the  Govern- 
ment "; — discovered  and  used  all  the 
notches  nature  has  placed  so  far  apart 
in  the  grim  escarpments  of  the  Rocky 
Mountains.  His  trails  crossed  them, 
leading  up  to  them  from  far  across  the 
plains.  Raton  Pass  is  in  this  sense  one 
of  the  oldest  gateways  of  the  world. 
The  existence  of  it  gave  rise  to  the 
great  trail  from  the  bend  of  the 
souri,  where  now  is  Kansas  City,  to  the 
Valley  of  the  Rio  Grande,  down  that 
valley  to  El  Paso ; — an  ancient  rock- 
bottomed  ford  ; — down  to  the  high- 
lands of  Mexico,  or,  by  other  passes  beyond,  to  the  Pacific 
coast. 

This,  in  much  later  days  now  historic  from  our  view,  was  utilized 
:ite  men.  The  few  Spanish  soldiers  who  followed  Coronado  on 
his  celebrated  expedition  to  Quivira,  came  and  returned  by  it, 
guided  by  an  Indian  whose  tale  of  Quivira  was  but  a  fabrication  to 
lure  unwelcome  visitors  away  from  his  people.  Later,  and,  indeed, 
comparatively  very  recently,  the  traders  took  it.  It  became  the 
<4  Santa  Fe  Trail."  The  bend  of  the  Missouri,  as  anciently,  was  still 


An  Early   Explorer. 


KANSAS  CITY.  15 

its  western  end.  We  measure  the  place  by  our  own  standards  ;  but 
it  was  of  immense  importance  long  before  it  had  become  even  West- 
port  Landing. 

This  old  trail,  lined  with  graves  and  wet  with  tears,  the  scene 
throughout  its  weary  length  of  innumerable  battles  that  are  not 
named  in  history,  the  place  of  toils  and  perils  that  can  never  be 
lived  again,  was  the  origin  of  the  idea  from  which  was  born  what  is 
now  known  as  the  Sante  Fe  Route.  We  are  interested  in  this  fact, 
and  in  all  that  may  be  said  about  the  various  trails  that  have  been 
usurped  by  the  most  colossal  of  the  commercial  achievements  of  man, 
because  we  shall  follow  one  of  them  on  this  journey  ourselves  almost 
as  it  lay  a  thousand  or  two  years  ago.  Perhaps  we  shall  find  that  its 
interest  has  not  all  quite  departed. 

Yet  Kansas  City,  by  that  name  at  least,  is  not  a  city  of  reminis- 
cences. The  western,  or  Santa  F6,  trade  did  not  begin  from  it  until 
1832,  when  Independence,  its  now  near  neighbor,  became  the  "  out- 
fitting" point  for  the  western  freighters.  "  Outfit  " — "  to  outfit," — 
seems  to  be  another  peculiarly  western  term,  now  become  a  part  of 
the  language.  The  first  stock  of  goods  was  landed  at  the  present 
site  of  Kansas  City  in  1834. 

But  even  this  was  some  time  before  the  quarrel,  for  the  boundary 
line  which  placed  the  then  unmade  and  undreamed-of  city  in  Mis- 
souri was  not  established  until  1836. 

In  1839  a  few  houses  seem  to  have  been  erected,  and  in  1853  the 
village  had,  at  most,  only  478  souls. 

In  1843-44  came  a  flood  which  submerged  the  place.  This  was 
followed  by  the  cholera.  The  growth  may  be  said  to  have  stopped 
during  this  period,  and  for  some  years  after.  In  the  same  year  the 
difficulty  between  Texas  and  New  Mexico — this  is  again  to  our 
eyes  quite  prehistoric — rendered  an  armed  escort  necessary  for  a 
Santa  ¥6  train.  This  doubtless  interfered  very  seriously  with 
business. 

But  so  important  was  this  trade  already  grown  that  books  were 

2 


16  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

published  on  the  subject  about  this  time.  The'y  read  like  foreign 
travels.  In  August,  1843,  all  the  Mexican  frontier  ports  of  entry 
were  closed,  and  remained  so  until  1850.  This  had  the  effect  of 
blockading  all  the  Missouri  river  towns. 

Mr.  D.  \V.  Wilder  ("  Annals  of  Kansas,"  p.  49)  says  that  on  August 
26,  1854,  Leavenworth  and  Kansas  City  were  first  mentioned  in  the 
N\\v  York  Tribune.  This,  then,  seems  to  have  been  about  the 
beginning  of  the  history  of  the  present  era.  They  may  have  been 
mentioned  before,  but  the  Tribune  settled  the  question  as  to  its 
having  previously  been  worth  while. 

Another  record  states  that  "  in  1857  the  city  had  grown  to  8,000 
inhabitants,  with  a  list  of  mercantile  houses  surpassing  any  Missouri 
town,  and  with  a  larger  trade  than  any  city  of  its  size  in  the  world." 

It  is  not  known  whether  or  not  the  writer  means  that  Kansas  City 
was  not  then  a  Missouri  town,  or  whether  he  excludes  St.  Louis  and 
other  places  from  his  mental  list  of  "  Missouri  towns."  It  may  have 
had  the  8,000  inhabitants  mentioned,  but  as  late  as  1859  it  did  not 
look  as  though  it  had  them,  at  least  as  permanently  established 
citizens. 

But,  at  least,  Kansas  City  is  one  of  the  places  that  has  grown,  and 
3,  almost  as  fast  as  they  say  she  does.  This,  of  itself,  consti- 
tutes the  place  a  western  phenomenon.  In  1*870  the  population  was 
stated  to  be  32,286.  In  1873,  40,140.  In  1885,  128,474.  It  now 
claims,  per  directory ',  180,000.  Mr.  Jay  Gould,  in  1886,  is  reported 
to  have  distinctly  stated  in  an  interview  with  a  prominent  citizen 
that  "in  twenty-five  or  thirty  years  more  you  will  see  Kansas  City  as 
large  as  Chicago  and  St.  Louis  are  at  that  time'' 

There  is  therefore  little  use  in  asking  "  upon  what  kind  of  meat 
doth  this  our  Caesar  feed."  It  is  a  wonderful  place,  offering  to  the 
tourist  from  older  communities  the  most  wonderful  of  all  the 
instances  of  western  growth.  The  same  circumstances  that  gave 
the  far-western  trading-post  her  business  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago, 
feed  her  now.  The  causes  of  greatness  are  perpetual.  Many  a 


KANSAS  CITY. 


17 


reader  will  have  no  taste  for  the  comparisons  of  local  history  and 
the  reminiscences  of  a  quarter  of  a  century.  Many  a  one  would 
have  more,  could  he  but  remember  the  wilderness  as  it  was,  and 
compare  the  present  with  the  dim  past  of  so  little  a  while  ago.  It  is 
one  of  the  valuable  lessons  of  the  trans-Contkental  journey  these 
pages  are  supposed  to  record. 


From  the  Other  End  of  the  Trail. 


-KANSAS. 


7T\( ')  get  back  to  the  depot  again,  to  see  the  crowd  that  was  not 

\  *tl  / 

P  here  yesterday  and  will  not  be  here  to-morrow  ;  yet  the  same 
crowd  ;  is  an  awakening  from  the  dream  of  the  Beginning  which 
may  possibly  seem  to  have  been  indulged  in. 

You  have  the  names  of  the  trains  called  in  the  long-drawn  and 
sorrowful  tones  customarily  heard  at  depots,  and  there  begin  to  be 
long  vacant  spaces  under  the  shed.  This  train  and  that  one  slip 
silently  away  ;  one  to  Chicago  or  St.  Louis,  or  both  ;  one  to  Omaha, 
another  to  Denver  and  San  Francisco.  There  are  more  than  a 
dozen  of  them  altogether,  and  these  very  long  and  very  well  filled 
trains  represent  about  thirty  thousand  miles  of  track.  Within  the 
past  year  Kansas  alone  has  had  her  surface  gridironed  by  about 
1,700  miles  of  new  steel. 

A  very  large  number  of  people  are  statistical,  and  every  man  in 
these  commercial  times  who  can  quote  figures,  is  respected  accord- 
ingly. Still  thinking  of  the  ox-teams,  and  huge  wagons,  and  bull- 
whackers,  of  twenty-five  years  ago,  the  waiting  reader  may  be  greatly 
interested  to  know  that  so  long  ago  as  during  1886  there  were  981,- 
264  trunks  handled  ; — they  call  it  "  handled  "  from  a  mere  native 
sense  of  humor — on  those  platforms,  and  looked  for  and  enquired 
about,  and  tumbled  and  slid  and  rolled,  under  and  across  that  time- 
worn  and  battle-scarred  piece  of  timber  at  the  door  of  the  baggage- 
room.  This  represents  an  immense  and  unknown  sum  in  ladies'  and 
gents'  furnishing  goods. 

During  the  same  year  4,960,320  people  got  on  and  off  these  trains. 
This  is  not  counting  travel  by  suburban  trains,  or  the  uncles,  cousins 
and  aunts  who  accompany  bridal  parties  to  the  depot. 

(18) 


KANSAS.  19 

There  are  about  $8,000,000  actually  invested  in  railroad 
property  within  the  limits  of  the  city.  All  the  steamboats  that 
«ver  plied  the  waters  of  the  Missouri  since  the  little  stern- 
wheeler  that  made  her  astonishing  appearance  here  in  1819, 
March  2d,  if  they  were  tied  end  to  end  and  trailed  out  by 
the  current,  would  not  represent  this  sum  in  value.  This  last 
statistic  is  guessed  at  all  the  more  freely  since  it  is  understood 
that  the  railroads  have  the  entire  business.  The  boats  have  gone 
with  the  camp-fires. 

"  Atchison,  Topeka  and  Santa  Fe.  All  aboard  for  Kansas,  Colo- 
rado and  Southern  Cal —  That  is  ours  ;  let  us  go. 

You  are  no  sooner  away  from  the  shadows  of  the  building  than 
you  are  on  modern  historic  ground.  There  is  often  very  little  justi- 
fication for  this  often-made  remark.  All  ground  is  in  a  certain  geo- 
logical sense  historic.  But  it  is  made  in  this  case  very  appropri- 
ately. A  very  distinct  group  of  sensations  are  evoked  at  the  name 
of  Kansas,  and,  after  all  the  strictly  historical  part  is  done  with,  the 
fact  remains  that  in  all  the  history  of  civilization,  of  which  Kansas 
makes  one  of  the  most  brilliant  chapters,  no  territory  of  equal  extent 
has  ever  afforded  so  great  and  lasting  a  benefit  to  the  average 
struggling  and  energetic  man. 

The  ground  now  comprising  the  State  of  Kansas  was  once  mostly 
owned  by  the  Pawnee  nation  of  Indians.  These  people  had  their 
vicissitudes,  for  when  settlements  began  first  to  be  made  the 
•country  was  held  by  the  Kaws.  The  remark  about  vicissitudes  is 
merely  an  inference  drawn  from  the  fact  apparent  to  anybody  who 
ever  knew  the  Kaws,  that  if  they  could  take  a  country  away  from 
anybody,  the  party  of  the  first  part  must  have  previously  had  vicis- 
situdes, or  something  almost  as  bad. 

The  Kaw,  or  Kansas,  Indians  gave  the  name  it  bears  to  the  State. 
Very  frequently  it  has  been  questioned  why  these  two  names  were 
interchangeable,  and  why  the  Indians,  and  the  river  upon  whose 
branches  they  lived,  should  be  known  by  the  one  name  or  the  other, 


20  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

indifferently,  or  the  Indians  by  one  name  and  the  State  by  another, 
or  rice  versa. 

Kanza,  Kanzas,  Kanzoe,  and  the  same  name  with  an  "  s  "  instead 
of  a  "z"  partakes  of  the  common  fate  of  all  our  Indian  names. 


The  Kaw  Valley    People  of  1855. 

"  Illinois,"  certainly,  has  had  the  same  troubles.  "  Kaw  "  is  the 
understanding  the  first  settlers  had  of  the  pronunciation  of  the  wurd 
"  Kansas  "  by  the  French  voyageurs,  who  were  the  tireless  wanderers 
of  the  early  times,  and  who  were  of  course  encountered  here. 


KANSAS.  21 

Actual  history,  in  our  sense,  begins  about  April  30,  1819,  upon 
which  date  the  treaty  was  signed  by  which  France  ceded  to  the 
United  States  the  Province  of  Louisiana.  This  included  all  of  the 
present  Kansas  except  that  strip  of  it  which  now  lies  south  of  the 
Arkansas  River.  That  strip  seems  to  have  been  won  by  conquest, 
contrary  to  what  they  call  the  "time-honored  "  policy  of  our  Gov- 
ernment. It  came  in  as  a  result  of  the  outrageous  little  war  in 
which  we  aired  our  valor  before  we  began  fighting  in  'earnest,  with 
something  to  fight  for.  The  territory  that  came  with  it  was  an 
enormous  slice,  covering  almost  the  whole  of  the  journey  we  are 
now  making. 

After  the  traders,  the  very  first  who  came  to  Kansas  were  the 
Missionaries.  From  the  records,  publications  and  journals  of  these 
little  missions,  the  information  has  been  derived  which  seems  to  have 
settled  definitely  and  at  last  the  disputed  personality  of  that  bold 
frontiersman,  the  "first  white  male  child  born  in  Kansas."  The 
matter  is  only  mentioned  here  because  of  the  offense  having  fre- 
quently been  laid  on  the  wrong  person.  Very  appropriately,  and 
with  poetic  fitness,  that  "first,"  etc.,  was  the  grandson  of  Daniel 
Boone.  His  name  wa3  Napoleon  Boone,  and  he  succeeded  to  his 
inheritance  of  fame  sometime  during  the  year  1825.  Somewhere 
about  the  southern  line  of  what  is  now  Jefferson  County,  the  event 
occurred.  It  was  well  inland,  and  is  thought  not  to  have  been  such 
an  unlawful  importation  of  a  voter  from  Missouri  as  became  too 
common  at  a  later  date. 

Some  of  the  most  charming  literature  in  the  English  language  was 
published  in  this  year  1825,  and  about  this  country.  But  Washing- 
ton Irving  was  very  indefinite  in  his  geography,  in  the  two  books, 
"Tour  of  the  Prairies,"  and  "The  Adventures  of  Captain  Bonne- 
ville."  It  only  appeared  to  him  as  it  must  have  to  those  early 
missionaries  and  Santa  Fe  traders.  It  was  a  beautiful  and  silent 
vastness.  The  country  had  been  "explored,"  but  there  were  no 
boundaries,  and  very  few  names.  Zebulon  Pike  and  his  brethren 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

had  made  these  delightful  marches  that  hundreds  of  boys  have  since 
envied,  through  a  land  that  was  so  full  of  meat  that  the  meat  was  in 
the  way.  What  is  now  the  pretty  city  of  Council  Grove  had  after- 
ward witnessed  a  meeting  of  Indian  head-men  with  the  United 
States  Commissioners  appointed  to  solicit  of  them  the  privilege  of 
crossing  the  plains,  their  undisputed  country,  from  Independence  to 
N\ -w  Mexico,  780  miles,  and  they  had  graciously  given  a  promise  they 
only  kept  at  intervals,  for  the  Santa  Fu  Trail,  as  has  been  stated,  was  a 
scene  of  ambuscades,  surprises,  and  bloody  fights  always.  It  is 
curious  how  valor  can  have  been  so  persistent  without  accompanying 
fame, — for  there  were  no  newspaper  reporters  in  those  days, — ana 
how  the  blue-stem  grass  or  the  waving  corn  has  long  since  overgrown 
a  thousand  bloody  graves  and  the  scenes  of  a  hundred  displays  of  the 
same  courage  that  is  commemorated  now  in  our  national  cemeteries. 
Within  a  mile  of  the  Union  depot  the  train  enters  Kansas.  All 
the  hills  you  see  rolling  away  to  the  southward  were  not  long  since 
covered  with  diamond-shaped  wagon  corrals,  and  glowing  in  the 
dusk  with  camp-fires.  It  was,  within  two  or  three  miles  of  the 
river,  a  vast  overland  camping-ground.  It  was,  so  to  speak,  the 
delta  of  the  great  trail; — a  curious  community  lacking  only  one  feature 
of  the  picturesqueness  of  the  West  of  a  little  later.  The  revolver  had 
not  yet  been  invented.  Whiskey  was  there — much  more  of  it,  and 
probably  much  better,  than  there  is  in  later  times  in  this  virtuous  com- 
monwealth; and  there  was  an  occasional  gun.  I>ut  it  was  of  the  long, 
old-fashioned,  slender-gripped  kind,  that  loaded  at  the  muzzle,  out 
of  a  powder-horn,  and  that  had  a  beautiful  piece  of  mechanism  in 
the  shape  of  a  flint-lock.  It  seems  incredible,  but  with  this  museum 
relic  all  the  sharp  and  desperate  battles  of  the  trail  were  fought. 
With  it  a  continent  was  practically  won.  All  American  history  is 
based  upon  it.  To  recall  it  with  all  the  vividness  one  can,  only 
causes  us  to  come  to  the  conclusion  that  the  Americans  of  those 
days  would,  had  there  been  necessity,  have  conquered  their  way  to 
empire  with  wayside  stones. 


KANSAS. 


23 


At  the  beginning  of  the  journey  it  may  be  well  to  formulate  a 
few  of  the  plainest  and  prosiest  of  the  facts  about  Kansas.  There 
is  plenty  of  romance  ;  and  a  long  category  of  peculiarities,  for  the 
State  has  a  most  remarkable  modern  history;  but  the  material  things 
very  likely  come  first  in  the  minds  of  the  majority  of  readers, 
though  it  was  sentiment,  clan,  pluck,  that  made  the  State  more 
than  the  material  advantages  or  favorable  circumstances  that  are  so 
much  discussed  in  the  tens  of  thousands  of  pages  of  descriptive 
printing  that  have  been  issued  since  in  her  behalf. 

Kansas  is  a  symmetrical  and  well-proportioned  oblong  square, 
lying,  as  a  whole,  quite  in  the  centre  of  the  Union.  This  square  is 
four  hundred  and  ten  miles  long,  and  two  hundred  and  ten  miles 


Early   Kansas  Residence. 

wide,  and  has  an  area  of  81,318  square  miles.  The  only  deviation 
from  a  square  in  the  configuration  of  the  State  is  caused  by  the  Mis- 
souri River,  with  a  northwestward  trend,  cutting  off  a  slice  of  the 
upper  right-hand  corner. 

One  must  think  twice  before  he.  can  quickly  comprehend  what 
has  passed  in  this  quadrangle  of  soil  in  the  way  of  material  develop- 
ment in  the  past  few  years,  and  when  one  lends  himself  to  a  con- 
templation of  the  picture,  judging  by  the  past,  the  result  must  be 
nothing  less  than  a  general  feeling  of  astonishment.  Were  Kansas 
as  densely  populated  as  New  England  is,  it  would  contain  thirty- 
three  million  people.  As  the  soil  is  so  much  better  that  there  is 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


KANSAS.  25 

no  comparison  between  the  two  sections  in  that  respect  ; — indeed,. 
Kansas  soil  would  be  worth  almost  anywhere  in  New  England 
probably  twenty-five  cents  a  cart-load  as  a  fertilizer  ; — one  can  but 
fairly  conclude  that  in  the  course  of  a  few  years  that  enormous 
population  must  be  attained.  Were  the  population  as  dense  as  it  is 
even  in  Ohio,  there  would  be  six  millions  of  population. 

In  1860,  the  year  before  the  State  was  admitted,  there  was  a 
population  of  107,206.  There  is  a  very  slight  doubt  whether  there 
were  quite  so  many  as  that.  At  the  end  of  ten  years,  or  in  1870, 
there  were  364,369  people. 

June  ist,  1880,  showed  a  population  of  996,096. 

March  i,  1885,  by  a  State  census,  there  were  1,268,530  people. 

There  is,  even  from  a  modern  and  western  standpoint,  something 
extraordinary  in  this  high  percentage  of  increase.  But  there  is 
another  view  from  which  it  is  much  more  remarkable.  This  increase, 
it  must  be  remembered,  has  taken  place  in  the  heart  of  a  desert. 
No  allusion  is  made  here  to  the  "Great  American,"  etc.,  of  the 
old  geographies.  That  glossy  and  polished  chestnut  has  been 
passed  around  for  twenty  years,  and  no  one  who  knows  how  the 
geographies  are  made  ever  wonders  at  their  teachings.  It  was  a 
desert  in  the  opinions  of  men  who  had  tramped  and  camped  all 
over  it;  who  knew  it  well.  The  explorers  believed  it  uninhabitable. 
The  traders  and  freighters  agreed.  The  more  learned  wrote 
elaborate  treatises  of  warning.  The  judicious  grieved.  The  writer 
hereof  once  had  the  adventurous  spirit  (under  orders)  to  travel  from 
end  to  end  of  the  very  best  of  Kansas, — the  Arkansas  Valley.  He 
was  possessed  of  an  amiable  mule,  which  he  rode,  and  when  the 
mule  was  wwamiable  he  walked.  The  whole  country  had  been  swept 
by  the  besom  of  desolation.  It  was  not  only  a  homeless  solitude; 
there  were  reasons  palpable  and  undoubted  why  it  should  never 
become  the  home  of  civilized  man. 

Now,  I  presume,  the  Arkansas  Valley  in  Kansas  contains  six  or 
seven  hundred  thousand  people.  Now,  there  is  every  reason  per- 


26  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

fectly  apparent  why  it  should  become  one  of  the  most  prosperous 
agricultural  regions  in  the  world,  yet  now,  even  yet,  one  is  aston- 
ished at  the  fool-hardiness,  the  temerity,  the  fatuousness,  that 
induced  the  building  through  this  waste,  at  that  time,  of  the  great 
railroad  upon  which  we  now  journey  to  the  Pacific  coast.  It  was 
the  great  cause  of  settlement,  and  there  was  not  a  habitation  even  in 
hope  when  it  first  stretched  its  lonesome  lines  of  iron  across  the 
silent  landscape. 

And  yet,  they  say  that  "  capital  is  timid."  The  fact  is,  that  capital 
is  merely  strange.  If  there  is  anything  which  makes  an  unneces- 
sary fuss  ;  that  sings  when  it  is  saddest  and  is  most  hilarious  and 
seemingly  jocund  when  its  back  is  broken,  it  is  capital.  It  is  the 
human  institution  that  has  a  thousand  forms  of  deceit.  But  it  is 
useless  to  say,  after  the  western  railroads,  and  the  money  it  took  to 
build  them,  and  the  circumstances,  that  capital  is  "timid." 

Kansas  is  subdivided  into  ninety-five  counties.  An  average  one 
of  these  counties  contains  about  a  half-million  acres  of  land. 
Most  of  them  approach  very  nearly  the  form  of  the  square.  All 
old-fashioned  notches  and  diagonals  are  left  off.  The  simplicity  of 
the  Government  surveys  has  been  adhered  to  wherever  possible. 

It  is  all  prairie.  Only  a  very  small  fraction  of  the  surface  ever 
had  any  timber  growth.  But  in  many  instances  that  which  was 
prairie  has  become  timber.  Millions  of  trees  have  been  planted, 
and  have  grown  into  fair-sized  timber  within  a  brief  time.  Trees 
completely  changed  the  original  appearance  of  the  country  in 
very  many  cases.  The  horizon  has  departed,  and  clumps  interrupt 
the  once  almost  boundless  view.  Kansas,  revisited  by  the  very 
early  settler,  has  a  tendency  to  make  him  retire  behind  a  hedge  or 
a  red  barn,  for  the  purpose  of  castigating  himself  for  not  guessing 
in  time  at  the  capacities  of  a  country  about  which  every  common- 
sense  indication,  every  gloomy  prophecy,  was  alike  completely  at 
fault.  They  said,  among  many  other  wise  things,  that  trees  wouldn't, 
wouldn't  grow.  God  did  not  intend  they  should,  or  He  would  have 


KANSAS.  2T 

planted  them  Himself.  It  was  a  pious  conclusion,  built  upon  the 
ideas  of  the  Old  School.  But,  like  others  of  the  same  kind,  it 
appears  to  have  been  erroneous.  Trees  not  only  grow,  but  in  this 
soil  that,  never  since  the  dawn  of  the  present  creation  until  now 
felt  the  thrill  of  a  creeping  rootlet,  they  grow  better  than  they  do 
elsewhere. 

The  general  idea  of  a  prairie  country  is  that  it  should  be  flat. 
This  is  not;  though  the  State  can  not  boast  a  mountain,  or  even 
anything  that  can  be  called  a  hill  except  by  a  considerable  stretch 
of  courtesy.  There  is  said  not  to  be  a  swamp  within  its  bound- 
aries. The  country  is  what  is  called  "  rolling,"  and  the  undulations 
are  very  charming  to  the  eye.  From  May  until  November,  Kansas 
is  well  worth  a  visit  for  the  mere  sake  of  feasting  the  eye  upon 
probably  the  most  charming  pastoral  landscape,  and  the  most  exten- 
sive, in  the  world.  It  will  not  answer  to  allow  yourself  to  become 
attracted  by  it  unless  you  propose  to  listen  to  the  promptings  which 
persuade  you  to  remain.  "Horizon  hungry"  is  a  phrase  that  has 
crept  inadvertently  into  the  language.  It  is  not  entirely  hyper- 
bole. Nooks  and  valleys  historically  charming  will  thereafter 
lose  their  spell  to  you, — because  they  are  too  small.  All  Kansas 
people  are  celebrated  for  an  unreasoning  poo-poohing  of  all  other 
localities.  It  is  aut  Kansas  aut  nihiL  Sometimes  one  thinks  they 
would  like  to  wall  her  in,  and  have  everything  to  themselves,  with 
a  few  reciprocity  and  other  treaties  with  those  they  liked,  and 
with  a  set  of  histories,  newspapers,  periodicals  and  poets  all  to 
themselves,  and  to  suit  them.  This  spirit  of  loyalty  has  aided 
largely  in  the  wonderful  growth  of  the  country,  and  has  its  avail- 
able side,  and  is  entirely  excusable  as  an  effect  of  locality  and 
climate.  But  it  has  made  possible  a  variety  of  treason  not  con- 
templated by  the  Constitution,  and  that  is  punishable  only  by 
epithets,  and  has  called  out  a  retaliatory  crop  of  denials  and  counter- 
charges. 

This  is  the  land  of  pretty  towns,  as  you  will  find  to  be  the  case  as 


KANSAS.  29 

you  rapidly  come  nearer  to  the  middle  of  the  "  desert."  They  have 
grown  and  changed  with  unequalled  rapidity  within  the  past  two 
years.  In  each  of  them  the  school-house  is  the  prominent  object. 
Only  in  the  very  newest  neighborhoods  is  the.  school-building  a  poor 
one,  and  it  may  be  said  with  certainty  that  it  never  long  remains  so. 
The  system  of  public  education  is  one  of  the  most  complete  possible, 
and  public  and  private  interest  in  the  education  of  the  masses  has 
not  flagged  from  the  beginning.  A  heavy  indebtedness  for  school- 
buildings  is  not  complained  of,  and  the  first  and  latest  effort  of 
every  man  who  comes  is  to  get,  first  a  school-house  ;  second,  a 
railroad.  There  is  one  eastern  feature  that  will  be  missed  ; 
there  are  no  "saloons."  It  is  true.  This  hideous  feature  of 
civilization  is  actually  eliminated.  The  Kansas  "  cranks "  are 
made  of  that  kind  of  material  that  they  actually  mean  their  theories. 
So  far  as  human  wisdom  can  see,  there  is  no  hope  of  the 
re-establishment  of  this  most  horrible  of  industries.  There  is 
now  no  question  of  either  the  wisdom  or  the  strength  of  the  anti- 
saloon  movement.  It  is  not  a  movement  ;  it  is  a  fact  acquiesced 
in  by  everybody. 

There  is,  among  minor  considerations,  something  very  remarkable 
about  the  "  luck  "  of  this  peculiar  commonwealth.  Every  mishap 
that  could  befall  her  by  conspiracy  of  all  the  malignant  powers  has 
befallen  her.  Nothing  could  be  more  terrible  than  the  drouth  of 
1860,  of  which  the  half  has  not  been  told,  or  the  grasshopper 
scourge  of  1874.  They  both,  to  all  appearances,  resulted  in  a 
splendid  advertisement  and  succeeding  booms.  Everything  that  it 
was  said  Kansas  could  not  do,  and  was  not  fitted  to  do,  she  has 
done. 

In  early  times  her  climate  was  most  discouraging  from  its  very 
inherent  and  incurable  disagreeableness.  The  wind  was  always 
blowing.  It  amounted  to  malice.  Everything  that  was  portable 
was  taken  by  the  wind  to  some  other  locality.  This  perpetual 
sirocco  was  not  occasional,  but  continuous.  It  did  not  rain  with 


M  ovi  :DE. 

any  regularity  even  during  the  (comparatively)  good  years,  and,  in 
fine,  the  weather,  and  anxiety  about  the  weather,  was  the  burden  of 
common  life. 

This  is  all  changed,  as  the  world  knows.     Why? 

The  last  "streak"  of  industrial  luck  that  has  strQck  the  cour. 
the  sugar  industry.     This   sugar  is  made  from  "sorghum"   cane, 
yields  largely,  can  be  made  with  certainty,  and  is  profitable  at  four- 
and -one-half  cents  per  pound  ;  perhaps  less.     There  is  no  locality 
outside  of  its  nativ  .vhere  this  cane  grows  so  big,  and  thick, 

and  tall,  and  sweet,  as  it  does  in  Kansas.  As  usual  with  enterprises 
here,  this  industry  is  dt  .  grow  with  great  rapidity.  There 

will  soon  be  sugar-houses  with  tall  chimneys  sticking  up  out  of  the 
landscape  even-where.     Nobody  will  have  ever  seen  these  chin 
before  except  in  the  midst  of  the  palms,  and  with  at   least  semi- 
tropical  surroundings. 

ive  been  raising  sorghum  in  the  western  por- 
tions of  the  State  as  a  forage-crop.  If  t!  sed  region  can  now 
come  forward  as  a  sugar-country,  it  will  succeed  in  turning  the 
tables  very  handsomely  upon  pn  putation. 

a  good  deal  a  more  modern  date 

than  any  thus  far  mentioned.     All  the  hili-  1    the 

timber,  and  out  to  the  soutl  ive  been  in  a  later  clay  than  that 

of  the  trail  tramped  over  by  those  who  were  making  1, 

with  great  effect,  and  more  of  it,  probably,  than  they  at  the  time 
supposed.     All  the  trails  leading  westward  from  the 
this  part  of  the  State  have  been  tramped  over  by  armed  men.    They 
did  not  live  here  ;  in  point  of  fact  they  had  not  the  least  business 
here,  and  did  not  come  to  M 

At  this  date,  and  to  younger  men,  the  whole  story  of  the  attempted 
conquest  of  Kansas  by  people  who  came  here  purposely  to  do  it, 
and  in  the  interest  direct  and  avowed  of  an  institution  as  dead  now 
as  Pompey  the  Great,  seems  absurd.  But  they  did  come,  and  they 
came  so  near  to  success  in  their  efforts  that  for  a  while  they  were 


KANSAS.  31 

•sure  they  had  succeeded.  However,  later  times  have  shown  that 
this  was  but  the  sign  of  an  approaching  revolution.  This  is  the 
sense  in  which  the  first  battles  of  the  great  war  were  fought  in  Kan- 
sas ;  a  remark  that  is  often  made. 

"No  wonder  they  wanted  it."  This  was  the  only  remark 
made  on  the  subject  by  a  gentleman  looking  out  at  the  car  win- 
dow on  this  same  route,  when  his  eye  fell  upon  the  landscape 


St«t«  Univertity 

a  few  miles  ea5t  of  Lawrence,  where  the  Wakarusa  joins  the  Kaw. 
The  country  had  a  charm  even  in  those  gloomy  days.  They 
M  wanted  "  it. 

A  few  minutes  before  noon  the  train  reaches  LAWRENCE.  It  is 
now  a  town  embowered  in  trees,  and  a  place  of  elegant  houses, 
often  referred  to  somewhat  tritely  as  "the  Athens  of  Kansas."  For 
the  State  University  is  here  ;  a  beautiful  building  crowning  the  hill 
west  of  the  city,  and  visible  for  many  miles  in  all  directions.  It  is 

3 


32  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

an  institution  that  has  received  especial  care  from  successive  Legis- 
latures, and  that  is  rapidly  growing  in  influence  and  educational 
facilities.  But  the  State  is  full  of  "  institutions  of  learning,"  de- 
nominational and  otherwise,  and  trie  public  interest  is  largely  con- 
centrated in  the  schools. 

Here,  on  the  right  of  the  train,  one  may  see  a  curious  sight, — for 
Kansas.  It  is  a  dam  across  the  Kaw  River  ;  the  only  one  in  sight  in 
a  long  journey.  It  is  the  only  one  ever  built  across  this  sandy  cur- 
rent, the  "bed-rock"  of  which  almost  always  eludes  the  eye  of 
industry. 

As  a  point  of  historical  interest,  Lawrence  takes  high  rank.  The* 
place  was  the  centre  and  capital  of  the  Free  State  side  of  the 
Kansas  struggle,  and,  then  and  since,  its  streets  have  witnessed 
strange  sights.  Here,  on  the  then  extreme  verge  of  western  civiliza- 
tion, it  has  been  burned,  purposely  and  by  enemies,  two  several  times. 
First,  when  it  was  a  mere  village,  but  a  very  widely  known  one,  on 
May  21,  1856,  and  last,  on  August  21,  1863. 

The  following  two  accounts  of  the  last  burning  are  given  in 
Wilder's  "Annals  of  Kansas."  The  first  was  written  by  the  Rev. 
Richard  Cordley,  D.  D.  The  last  appeared  in  a  book  called  "  Shelby 
and  his  Men,"  printed  in  Cincinnati  in  1867,  and  it  gives  a  Confed- 
erate view  of  the  massacre. 

Mr.  Cordley's  acconnt: 

"Early  in  the  Summer  of  1863,  a  large  band  entered  Olathe,  one  night,  about 
midnight.  They  took  most  of  the  citizens  prisoners,  and  kept  them  till  their  work 
was  done.  They  plundered  the  town,  carried  off  what  they  wanted,  and  destroyed 
other  property,  and  left  before  daylight.  They  killed  some  seven  men. 

"  Some  time  after  they  sacked  the  town  of  Shawnee  twice.  In  addition  to  rob- 
bery, they  burned  most  of  the  town.  Several  were  killed  here  also.  Individual 
murders  and  house-burning  were  common. 

"  On  the  zoth  <  f  August,  a  body  of  between  three  and  four  hundred  crossed  the 
State  line  at  sundown.  Riding  all  night  they  reached  Lawrence  at  daybreak.  They 
dashed  into  the  town  with  a  yell,  shooting  at  everybody  they  saw.  The  surprise 
was  complete.  The  hotel,  and  every  point  where  a  rally  would  be  possible,  was- 


KANSAS.  33 

seized  at  once,  and  the  ruffians  then  began  the  work  of  destruction.  Some  of  the 
citizens  escaped  into  the  fields  and  ravines,  and  some  into  the  woods,  but  the  larger 
portion  could  not  escape  at  all.  Numbers  of  those  were  shot  down  as  they  were 
found,  and  often  brutally  mangled.  In  many  cases  the  bodies  were  left  in  the  burn- 
ing buildings,  and  were  consumed.  The  Rebels  entered  the  place  about  five 
o'clock,  and  left  between  nine  and  ten.  Troops  for  the  relief  of  the  town  were 
within  six  miles  when  the  Rebels  went  out.  One  hundred  and  forty-three  were  left 
dead  in  the  streets,  and  about  thirty  desperately  wounded.  The  main  street  was  all 
burned  but  two  stores.  Thus,  about  seventy-five  business  houses  were  destroyed, 
and  nearly  one  hundred  residences.  They  destroyed  something  near  two  millions 
of  property,  left  eighty  widows  and  two  hundred  and  fifty  orphans  as  the  result  of 
their  four  hours'  work.  Scenes  of  brutality  were  enacted  which  have  never  been 
surpassed  in  savage  warfare.  The  picture  is  redeemed  only  by  the  fact  that  women 
and  children  were  in  no  case  hurt." 

The  Confederate  view: 

"About  daylight  on  the  morning  of  August  21,  1863,  Quantrill,  with  three 
hundred  men,  dashed  into  the  streets  of  Lawrence,  Kansas.  Flame  and  bullet, 
waste  and  pillage,  terror  and  despair,  were  everywhere.  Two  hundred  were  killed. 
Death  was  a  monarch,  and  men  bowed  down  and  worshiped  him.  Blood  ran  in 
rivulets.  The  guerrillas  were  unerring  shots  with  revolvers  and  excellent  horsemen. 
General  Lane  saved  himself  by  flight;  General  Collamcre  took  refuge  in  a  well,  and 
died  there.  Poor  Collamore!  He  should  have  kept  away  from  the  well,  upon  the 
principle  that  actuated  the  mother  who  had  no  objection  to  her  boy's  learning  how  to 
swim,  if  he  didn't  go  near  the  water.  Printers  and  editors  suffered.  Speer  of  the 
Tribune,  Pa'mcr  of  the  Journal,  Trask  of  the  State  Journal,  hadn't  time  even  to 
write  their  obituaries.  Two  camps  of  instruction  for  white  and  negro  soldiers,  on 
Massachusetts  street  (of  course),  were  surrounded  and  all  their  occupants  killed. 
Every  hotel,  except  the  City  Hotel,  was  burned.  Other  property,  valued  at  two 

million  dollars,  was  also  fired  and  consumed Massachusetts  street  was 

made  a  mass  of  smouldering  ruins.  Sometimes  there  is  a  great  deal  in  a  name — in 
this  instance  more  than  is  generally  the  case.  After  killing  every  male  inna-bitant 
who  remained  in  Lawrence,  after  burning  the  houses  in  the  town  and  those  directly 
around  it,  Quantrill  very  quietly  withdrew  his  men  into  Missouri  and  rested  there,  fol- 
lowed, however,  at  a  safe  distance,  by  General  Lane,  who  made  terrible  threats,  but 
miserable  fulfillments.  Two  hundred  white  abolitionists,  fifty  or  sixty  negroes,  and 
two  millions  of  dollars'  worth  of  property  were  fearful  aggregates  of  losses." 


34  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

The  purely  political  history  of  these  times  in  Kansas  is  very  inter- 
esting, especially  in  the  light  of  later  events.  But  it  can  not  be 
given  here. 

Eleven  miles  west  of  Lawrence  is  another  celebrated  town.  It  is 
LECOMPTON,  the  ancient  capital  of  Kansas  under  the  pro-slavery 
organization.  It  is  now  a  country  hamlet,  changed  in  its  politics 
and  in  all  other  aspects.  Here,  overgrown  with  vegetation,  and 
looking  as  ancient  as  Thebes,  are  the  ruins  of  the  old  times.  There 
are  foundations  of  an  elaborate  Capitol  building  whose  walls  never 
grew  beyond  the  basement  and  upon  which  a  religious  college  now 
stands.  There  are  the  remains  of  the  jail  where  the  "  Yankees  " 
were  confined,  when  caught,  upon  charges  of  high  political  crimes, 
and  under  a  peculiar  construction  of  the  constitutional  definition  of 
"treason."  Many  of  the  first  settlers  of  Kansas  obtained  on  this 
historic  spot,  and  in  this  "  Bastile,"  their  most  valuable  political  cap- 
ital, upon  which  they  did  a  fair  business  for  many  years  afterward. 

Reminiscences  and  association  might  have  a  rich  field  here,  but  it 
is  a  busy  country,  and  a  very  changeful  one.  The  growing  trees, 
the  fields  of  tall  corn,  the  creeping  carpet  of  sod,  seem  to  have, 
spired  with  the  new-comers  and  the  rising  generation  to  obliterate 
all  the  past.  There  is  no  country  where  less  attention  is  paid  to  the 
<-ens  and  the  might-have-beens.  The  revolutionary  war  is 
scarcely  more  a  memory  than  are  those  recent  times  when  men  seem 
to  have  gone  stark-mad  over  a  political  idea  ;  when,  for  the  sake 
of  perpetuating  an  institution  that  was  even  then  doomed  if  there  is 
justice  in  Heaven,  they  were  dyeing  this  virgin  soil  with  the  blood  of 
rapine  and  murder.  And  all  the  while,  by  their  misdirected  endeav- 
ors, they  were  doing  what  they  could  to  bring  about  a  result  pre- 
cisely opposite  from  that  which  they  desired.  Here  they  succeeded  in 
awaking  that  phlegmatic  northern  lion  who  had  up  to  that  date 
hardly  so  much  as  growled.  He  stayed  awake  for  five  years  after  ; 
he  refused  to  lie  down  again  ;  and  when  1861  came  he  was  still  alert, 
and  ready  to  begin  that  contest  of  four  years  during  which  he  never 


KANSAS.  35 

slept.  This  is  the  sense  in  which  the  War  was  begun  in  Kansas. 
The  fatuous  and  foolish  criminalities  of  early  Kansas  taught  the 
country  what  to  expect.  Nine  men  in  ten,  regardless  of  mere  party, 
were  angry  about  it.  Old  John  Brown,  beginning  his  career  here, 
went  on  to  Harper's  Ferry.  Mrs.  Stone  had  written  "  Uncle  Tom," 
and  Helper  contributed  his  prophetic  book.  The  country  is  still 
full  of  grizzled  old  fellows  who  were  partakers  in  every  peril  of 
those  times.  Some  of  them,  as  they  pass  by  on  a  railway  train  that  was 
not  dreamed  of  then,  may  look  out  at  Lecompton  with  a  grim  smile, — 
remembering  how  full  the  place  was  of  the  preliminary  parodies 
upon  their  own  later  experiences.  At  one  time  nearly  a  hundred 
free  State  men  were  confined  here,  and  had  many  of  the  experi- 
ences of  prisoners  of  war ;  vermin,  bad  food,  etc.  They  kept 
escaping,  and  could  not  be  caught  again.  One  night  all  who  remained 
were  released  by  a  surprise  party  of  their  friends. 

At  about  one  o'clock,  TOPEKA  is  reached.  Here  is  served  the 
first  dinner  of  the  journey,  in  the  first  of  the  longest  serie^  of 
hotels. on  the  continent,  and  whose  cookery  and  attendance  one  dis- 
covers to  be  an  especial  feature  of  the  trip.  The  dining-car  system 
has  not  been  adopted.  The  journey  is  a  long  one,  and  it  is 
pleasanter  for  passengers  to  seat  themselves  at  a  table  that  stands 
still,  and  enjoy  a  meal  for  which  the  old-fashioned  twenty  minutes 
gives  place  to  a  full  half-hour. 

Very  little  of  the  actual  Topeka  can  be  seen  from  the  depot. 
The  extensive  village  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  depot  consists  of 
the  very  extensive  shops,  warehouses  and  yards  of  the  Company, 
and  the  homes  of  a  small  army  of  employe's. 

The  Santa  Fe  system  was  born  in  Boston,  but  it  was  conceived 
in  Topeka.'  Away  back  in  the  sixties,  when  the  infant  State  was  at 
that  age  when  nothing  could  be  foretold  of  her  more  than  can  be 
of  the  average  infant,  the  scheme  which  has  since  developed  into 
some  eight  thousand  miles  of  steel  track  occurred  to  the  private 
consciousness  of  a  citizen  of  the  little  prairie  village.  Of  course, 


86  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

the  origin  of  the  idea  was  the  trail,  and  the  fact  that  an  extensive 
trade  existed  in  the  precise  direction  to  be  taken  by  the  locomotive ; 
— when  it  should  come.  This  dream,  which  should  then  have 
consigned  its  author  to  a  lunatic  asylum  if  there  had  been  any, 
should  now  constitute  a  sufficient  reason  for  his  perpetuation  in 
bronze.  The  story  of  the  difficulties  encountered  before  the 
"  timidity  "  of  capital  could  finally  be  overcome,  would,  if  truly 
told,  constitute  an  attractive  industrial  romance  of  itself.  The 
dream  came  true.  It  remains  a  fact.  The  dreamer,  now  only  in 
middle  life,  has  long  been  enjoying  the  substantial  fruits  of  per- 
sistence in  a  chimerical  idea. 

One  of  the  secrets  of  the  success  of  Kansas  has  been  that  the 
State  was  from  the  beginning  specially  helped  by  a  peculiar  quality 
of  brains.  The  dreamers  have  made  it.  A  hundred  schemes  have 
been  born  since  then,  all  of  them  ridiculous  in  the  beginning,  but  a 
considerable  percentage  of  them  very  successful  now.  The  con- 
servatism of  old  communities  has  never  had  a  place.  The  field  was 
wide,  and  everything  was  to  be  yet  done,  and  they  did  it.  The 
Santa  Fe  Route  is  only  one  example.  Hut  it  was  the  boldest  of  all. 
There  is  a  sense  in  which  the  State  of  Kansas  owes  more  to  this 
extraordinary  conception  in  the  mind  of  a  private  citizen  than  she 
does  to  any  other  fact  in  her  history. 

About  the  time  of  the  beginning  of  the  idea  of  the  San- 
Route,  the  village  of  Topeka  was  decided  upon  as  the  capital  <>f  '.he 
State.     The   prominence  of  the  place  was  thereafter  more  or  less 
assured.     There  are  now  about  thirty  thousand  people  here,  and  it 
is  the  political  and  social  centre  of  the  commonwealth. 

This  road  has  two  Missouri  River  termini  ;  one  at  Atchison,  the 
other,  and  chiefest,  at  Kansas  City.  The  stem  of  the  grotesque 
"  V,"  for  the  two  arms  of  which  Topeka  is  the  junction  point, 
extends  almost  indefinitely  down  to  the  southwestward.  They  call 
it  "  down "  here,  presumably  because  it  is  up.  It  is  a  western 
fashion  ;  they  frequently  call  a  man  "  Governor  "  during  ail  the 


KANSAS. 


37 


remainder  of  his  life,  simply  because  he  never  was  a  governor,  and 
is  known  to  have  sincerely  wished  to  be.     It  is  really  up  ;  about 
fc^S,  8,000    feet   of    steady   climb   before'  one 

reaches  the  crest  of  the  long  slope  which 
is  the  western  side  of  the  Missouri-Mis- 
sissippi Valley  at  Raton  Tunnel. 

For  instance,    Kancas  City  is   765  feet 
above   sea-level.     The   short    distance   to 
Topeka  includes  a  climb  of  135  feet.     A 
hundred  and  thirty-four  miles  farther,  at 
Newton,  just  at  the  beginning  of  what  in 
late  years  has  been  distinctively  known  as 
8    "the  plains,"  you  are  1,454  feet  high  ;— 
i    a  climb  of   554   feet   more; — and    so    on 
c    westward.      Reduced    to    a    scale   whose 
•o    differences  are  appreciable  to  the  eye,  as 
?   in  the  profile,  and  it  is  the  steep  side  of 
x    a  gigantic  ridge.     It  does  not  take  many 
*    hours  of  travel  to  reach  an  elevation  as 

c 

I    high  as  Mount  Washington,  and  one  never 
j    thinks  of    the  fact,  since  nothing  in   the 
surroundings  indicates  it  to  the  eye. 

So  overgrown  with  trees  is  Topeka  that 
in  Summer  it  almost  produces  the  im- 
pression that  it  is  situated  in  native  and 
natural  woods,  where  only  some  of  the 
trees,  and  not  enough  of  them,  have  been 
cut  out.  Grass,  of  the  thickest  and  green- 
est variety,  is  also  plentiful.  Also,  in 
Summer-time,  the  outlying  streets  and  vac- 
ant lots  are  thickly  grown  with  gigantic 
yellow  sunflowers.  But  there  is  nothing 
else  about  the  place  that  would  indicate 


§§§ 


0000 


38  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

any  particular  devotion  to  the  aestheticism  of  which  this  weed  is  the- 
accepted  emblem. 

This  growth  of  trees  and  vegetation  is  not  so  remarkable  unless 
taken  in  connection  with  another  fact ;  that  the  soil  upon  which  the 
city  stands  was  always  celebrated  for  its  poverty,  being  of  the  hardest 
and  yellowest  variety  of  "  hard-pan,"  which  twenty  years  ago  was 
not  considered  capable  of  the  faintest  of  those  cachinnations  the  earth 
is  said  to  indulge  in  when  tickled  with  a  hoe.  It  was  covered  with 
a  short  and  wiry  growth  of  grass  that  looked  like  dead  moss  and  was 
the  recognized  emblem  of  poverty.  This  may  answer  for  a  hundred  or 
more  places  in  Kansas,  and  seems  to  be  one  of  the  features  of  that 
much-discussed  "climatic  change  "  that  has  wrought  a  miracle  upon 
all  the  country  lying  west  of  the  Missouri  for  five  hundred  miles,  still 
growing  less  and  less  apparent  as  the  limit  is  approached.  Time  was 
when  no  upland  in  the  State  was  considered  valuable.  The  majority 
were  of  the  opinion  that  it  could  never  be  tilled.  When  Western  Kan- 
sas is  reached  the  reader  will  form  that  opinion  of  it,  forgetful  of  the 
fact  that  the  whole  State  was  once  under  the  same  ban.  This  opinion 
was  almost  universally  entertained  about  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago. 

The  view,  in  Summer,  from  the  roof  of  any  public  building  i:i 
Topeka  is,  excepting  the  San  Gabriel  Valley  of  California  and  the 
famed  Valley  of  Mexico,  the  most  beautiful  pastoral  landscape  in 
this  country,  or  perhaps  in  any  country. 

Immediately  south  of  Topeka  we  pass  the  Osage  coal-fields. 
These  were  a  great  find  in  their  day,  because  they  solved  the  ques- 
tion of  fuel  for  the  country  west,  of  whose  resources  little  was  then 
known,  though  it  was  known  that  wood  for  fuel  was  one  of  the  things 
not  to  be  thought  of.  The  mining  villages  of  this  region  are  like  those 
elsewhere,  and  seem  an  incongruity  in  the  surrounding  landscape. 

One  of  the  pretty  cities  of  Kansas  is  EMPORIA,  passed  about  the 
middle  of  the  afternoon.  It  is  also  reputed  to  be  the  wealthiest 
city  per  capita.  Its  main  street  is  headed  by  the  State  Normal 
School,  visible  at  a  glance  as  the  train  passes. 


KANSAS.  39* 

Emporia  is  situated  in  the  centre  of  what  is  perhaps  the  richest 
agricultural  region  in  any  of  the  western  States.  The  valleys  of 
the  Xeosho  and  the  Cottonwood  meet  here,  and  either  of  them  may 
be  very  well  compared  in  extent,  richness  and  variety  of  products 
with  the  Muskingum,  the  Scioto,  the  Mohawk  or  the  Connecticut 
A  few  miles  below,  and  at  the  junction  of  the  two  "creeks,"  as  they 
are  usually  considered  here,  is  a  natural  curiosity  for  this  country. 
It  is  a  body  of  timber  considerably  larger  than  any  other  between 
the  Missouri  and  the  Rocky  Mountains. 

NEWTON  is  reached  at  about  six  o'clock.  It  is  an  eating  station,, 
and  a  most  comfortable,  not  to  say  an  imposing  one. 

But  did  the  reader  ever  hear  of  Newton?  Look  out  over  the 
pretty  town,  as  civil  a  place  as  one  could  wish  to  see;  enter  this, 
dining-hall  where  a  meal  is  served  that  is  scarcely  to  be  excelled  in 
Chicago,  and  not  certainly  elsewhere  west  of  the  Missouri;  and  then 
recall  what  Newton  was  about  eighteen  hundred  and  seventy-two. 
It  was  the  extremest  verge  of  the  civilization  that  was  beginning  to 
creep  over  the  face  of  the  plains,  and  was  the  "  hardest "  community 
on  this  continent  at  that  date.  Only  Julesburg  had  in  its  day  been 
worse.  They  counted  that  day  lost  whose  low-descending  sun  saw 
no  man  killed  or  other  mischief  done.  There  is  a  spot  near  where 
they  used  to  "  plant"  them  in  those  days;  those  distinguished  ones, 
who  "died  with  their  boots  on."  Poker  and  monte,  and  the  dispen- 
sing and  imbibing  of  drinks  were  the  only  industries.  The  town 
was  a  slab  and  canvas  emporium,  full  of  idleness,  prostitution,  vice 
of  all  varieties,  squalor,  and  general  and  unmitigated  horror.  There 
were  no  farms,  or  any  thought  of  agriculture,  and  the  silent  plains, 
and  the  treeless  valley  of  the  Arkansas,  stretched  westward  to  the 
mountains.  It  was  the  "western  progress"  ridiculed  by  the  eastern 
press,  and  dwelt  upon  at  great  length  in  all  its  hideous  phases.  It 
is  the  idea  of  western  progress  still  cherished  by  hundreds  of  well- 
meaning  people. 

Look  about  you  now,  as  the  sun  sets  upon  the  fair  scene,  and  you 


KANSAS.  41 

will  be  able  to  carry  away  with  you  a  picture  of  the  actual  progress 
with  which  the  other  had  nothing  to  do  ;  a  pretty  town,  farms  lying 
on  all  sides,  leagues  of  fruitful  soil,  happy  homes,  church  spires, 
school-houses,  all  the  sounds  and  sights  of  prosperous  industry,  and 
a  visible  wealth  that  is  growing  so  rapidly  that  there  are  almost  no 
poor  men. 

There  are  scores  of  towns  like  this,  and. Newton  is  not  an  excep- 
tional place.  There  is  a  long  night  before  you,  to  be  passed  in  the 
rumbling  oblivion  of  the  sleeping  car.  If  it  were  only  daylight 
there  would  be  some  curious  experiences  for  one  making  the  journey 
for  the  first  time.  As  it  is,  if  at  any  time  before  one  o'clock  in  the 
morning  you  look  out  of  the  window,  you  may  see  a  white  glow  upon 
the  horizon  and  specks  of  brilliancy  that  look  like  rows  of  setting 
stars.  These  are  the  electric  lights  of  the  towns  strewn  along  the 
track  in  the  "desert." 

For  at  Newton  you  are  really  entering  upon  that  historic  deso- 
lation. Not  with  reference  now  to  the  humorous  geographies  ;  not 
by  inference  and  ignorance  ;  but  actually.  Some  concessions  had 
been  made  by  the  public  to  eastern  Kansas,  and  thus  far  only  the 
facts  of  the  geography  had  been  exploded.  This  region  was  not 
included  in  that  kindness.  The  line  was  drawn  about  here,  and  all 
to  the  westward  was  at  least  "  uninhabitable."  The  plainsmen  them- 
selves agreed  to  this,  and  this  railroad  company,  who  then  owned 
some  three  million  acres  of  land  here,  did  not  insist  upon  its  value  west 
of  a  certain  line  more  or  less  definite.  The  last  acre  of  this  land  has 
long  since  been  sold,  and  of  the  alternate  sections  belonging  to  the 
Government  there  is  not  a  "  quarter  "  left. 

Absolute  scientific  fact  was  of  no  value  here.  People  did  not 
believe  the  deductions  were  correct.  They  came  anyhow,  and  no 
man  is  so  well  acquainted  with  human  nature  as  to  be  able  precisely 
to  tell,  even  now,  after  the  fact,  why  they  came. 

All  the  ancient  and  striking  features  of  the  Arkansas  Valley,  and 
the  wide  country  that  lay  on  either  side  of  it  for  some  hundreds  of 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

miles,  have  been  changed.  Perhaps  it  is  the  breaking  of  that  oppres- 
sive spell  of  silence  that  used  to  hang  over  it.  Perhaps  it  is  the 
consciousness  that  people  do  live  here,  whether  we  see  them  or  not. 
At  any  rate,  the  old  times  are  gone. 

Crossing  the  almost  level  plain  between  Newton  and  Hutchinson, 
the  Arkansas  Valley  is  entered  at  the  latter  place.  Thence  west- 
ward for  three  hundred  miles  the  route  lies  beside,  or  near,  that 
silent  stream. 

It  has  been  called  the  "  Nile  of  America."  It  is  not  known  pre- 
cisely why,  but  the  idea  seemed  poetic  and  attractive,  and  we  will 
consider  it  to  be  such,  in  the  want  of  any  other  convenient  Nile,  and 
in  view  of  the  necessity  for  having  one.  It  was  silent,  lone,  treeless; 
a  break  in  the  prairie  without  banks  or  bluffs  on  either  side  for  long 
distances ;  sandy,  shifting,  treacherous,  and  its  unattractive  and 
unromantic  current  the  color  of  ashes.  Its  sources  were  for  a  long 
time  untraced,  and  it  reaches  the  Mississippi  a  thousand  miles  from 
where  we  now  see  it  in  Kansas,  after  passing  through  two  or  three 
climates  and  as  many  States. 

A  dozen  years  ago  its  banks  were  as  uninhabited  as  those  of  any 
wilderness  river  in  any  corner  of  the  world.  The  prairie-dog  towns 
were  built  beside  it,  their  outraged  inhabitants  seeming  to  hold 
indignation  meetings,  and  barking  querulous  protests  against  the  other 
diggers  and  delvers  who  were  lately  come,  against  the  rumble  and  roar 
and  sounds  of  escaping  steam  that  had  begun  to  disturb  the  peace  and 
quiet  of  these  exemplary  burghers.  The  two  very  lonesome  lines  of 
steel  among  the  sedges  were  unauthorized  by  either  the  dogs  or  by 
the  common  sense  of  the  times.  They  have  long  since  been  worn 
out  by  traffic,  and  been  replaced.  They  have  ceased  to  be  lone- 
some, and  are  now  a  part  of  the  landscape.  Yet,  there  is  still 
something  almost  supernatural  in  the  distant  flash  of  the  headlight  as 
it  creeps  nearer  and  nearer  through  the  silence  and  darkness  across 
the  reaches  of  the  prairie  by  night.  There  is  still  something  ominous 
in  the  long  trail  of  heavy  smoke  that  lies  along  the  horizon  by  day. 


KANSAS. 


43 


The  picture  of  the  old  time  does  not  occur  to  many  of  the  push- 
ing inhabitants  of  the  plains  now.  It  has  gone  in  the  past,  and  is 
of  no  concern  to  modern  interests.  Away  from  the  town  and  the 
track,  and  between  fields,  as  it  were,  one  might  still  see  something 
of  it.  Glimpses  of  the  historic  trail  may  be  caught  occasionally 
from  the  windows  of  the  train.  The  dog  towns  are  still  there,  half- 
deserted  it  is  true,  and  lacking  the  air  of  opulence  and  prosperity 


A  Kansas  Dog-Town. 

which  once  characterized  them.  But  the  chiefest  and  most  striking 
mark  of  the  departed  days  are  the  buffalo  trails,  now  obliterated  near 
the  line  but  still  visible,  after  twenty  years,  among  the  hills. 

The  coumry  was  in  those  days  crossed  from  South  to  North  by 
innumerable  paths  cut  deeply  into  the  sod.  They  were  almost 
endless,  for  they  began  in  Texas  and  ended  in  Manitoba.  The 
bison  trailed  himself  in  long  lines  and  innumerable  hosts  northward 
in  the  spring,  and  back  again  in  autumn.  Filling  himself  with  grass 


44  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

he  lay  down  to  ruminate  upon  it,  cow-fashion.  Rising  up,  the 
great  host  began  its  journey  again.  Every  day  some  miles  of 
progress  were  made.  As  it  went,  the  herd  fell  into  parallel  lines, 
one  animal  walking  behind  the  other.  Thirst  impelled  them  to  a 
more  rapid  progress  over  the  "divide"  to  the  next  stream.  Good 
pasturage  delayed  them.  One  herd  was  followed  by  another  as 
long  as  the  migrating  season  lasted.  And  so  across  the  plains,  for  a 
width  of  two  or  three  hundred  miles,  these  deep  paths  lay  side  by 
side  innumerable.  They  are  now  all  that  is  left  to  remember  the 
bison  by,  though  so  short  a  time  ago  he  was  here  in  such  countless 
multitudes.  The  plow  obliterates  them  with  all  other  signs  of  a 
curious  Past. 

Then  the  gray  thief  of  the  wilderness  yelped  the  night  watches 
away,  barking  to  hear  himself,  and  enamored  of  his  own  voice. 
The  camp-fire  was  his  guiding  star,  and  he  smelled  the  frying-pan 
from  afar.  In  the  early  morning,  herds  of  antelopes  would  appear 
for  a  moment  on  the  hills,  and  then  were  gone  like  phantoms  of  the 
mirage — the  gracefulest  and  nimblest  of  the  denizens  of  perpetual 
silence  and  unbroken  peace. 

Skulking  bands  of  Apaches  or  Kiowas,  dragging  all  their  posses- 
sions on  lodge-poles  that  trailed  behind  lean  ponies,  and  riding 
single-file  around  the  hills,  added  the  only  feature  of  human  life  to- 
a  scene  whose  wildness  was  otherwise  unbroken  for  hundreds  of 
square  miles. 

As  to  climate,  it  is  the  great  question  now;  it  was  then.  It  was 
a  dry  country,  but  nowhere  could  it  rain  harder  and  faster  than  it 
did  on  the  plains.  The  terrific  storms  of  midsummer  were  prom- 
inent among  the  reminiscences  of  the  old  plainsmen  ;  the  rain 
came  down,  not  in  showers,  but  in  sheets,  and  the  deluge  was  accom- 
panied by  terrific  thunder  that  broke  in  three  or  four  sharp  explo- 
sions in  the  same  spot.  Electric  phenomena  of  other  varieties  were 
not  uncommon.  Balls  and  circles  of  fire  rolled  along  the  ground. 
Stock  was  stampeded  by  unusual  exhibitions  of  flame  and  sound,  all 


KANSAS.  4& 

the  low  places  would  be  flooded,  and  rivers  would  rush  down,  the 
water-courses,  carrying  everything  before  them.  In  the  morning  all 
would  be  over  and  the  ground  almost  dry.  The  fuzzy  grass  shed 
the  water  like  a  thatch.  No  rain  ever  soaked  the  plains.  The  sun 
come  out  again,  a  relentless  tyrant  who  burned  the  long  clay 
through,  for  weeks  at  a  time,  without  a  cloud. 

All  Summer  a  wind  that  never  ceased  or  rested  swept  across  the 
country  from  the  South.  It  bore  all  the  aridness  of  a  thousand 
leagues  of  heated  soil  upon  its  wings.  It  was  often  so  hot  that  it 
seemed  to  scorch.  Flying  dust  came  with  it,  and  the  good-sized 


*V^  Holding  an  Indignation  Meeting. 

pebble  stones  stung  the  face  like  hail.  There  was  a  mixture  of 
"alkali,"  also,  and  this  blistered  the  lips  and  inflamed  the  eyes. 
Only  when  night  came  again  was  there  peace,  and  a  more  splendid 
sparkle  of  moonlight  or  stars,  a  balmier  sweetness  of  the  air,  were 
never  known. 

In  Winter,  the  wind  came  just  the  same,  but  from  the  North,  and' 
laden  with  the  breath  of  the  Arctic  zone.  There  was  not  then,  and 
there  hardly  is  now,  a  more  striking  scene  of  desolation  than  the 
plains  in  winter.  A  snow  storm  is  a  terror,  not  from  quantity,  but 
because  it  stings  and  numbs  and  blinds.  It  is  not  of  the  quality  of 


46 


OVERLAND   GUIDE. 


the  heavy  snow-falls  that  fill  the  northern  woods.  When  it  comes, 
there  is  nothing  to  do  but  to  wait  until  it  is  over.  It  means 
less  now  ;  there  is  shelter;  there  are  hedgerows  and  houses;  there 
are  landmarks  and  roads.  Then,  to  the  wayfarer  it  was  death. 


Western  Kansas  Cattle. 

If  you  could  see  this  same  picture  now,  in  the  light  of  a  Summer 
morning,  you  would  think  the  above  one  of  the  most  uselessly 
extravagant  sketches  ever  written. 

In  the  morning  especially  under  consideration  now  ; — something 
less  than  twenty-four  hours  from  Kansas  City; — you  will  find  your- 
self somewhere  very  near  the  western  boundary  of  Kansas.  Break- 
fast should  await  you  at  LA  JUNTA,  Colorado.  You  may  fancy  that 


KANSAS.  47 

your  car  has  an  imperceptible  slant  upward  at  the  forward  end. 
There  may  be  perceived,  perhaps,  a  faint  balsamic  odor  in  the  air, 
and  vast  blue  shapes,  tipped  or  sprinkled  with  pure  white,  may  lie 
upon  the  horizon.  You  will  see  at  hand  the  flat-topped  hills  called 
mesas  (;;/tfy-sas)  from  their  resemblance  to  a  mesa; — a  table.  You 
will  have  attained  an  altitude  of  about  four  thousand  feet,  and  be 
able  to  see  by  a  hundred  new  sensations  that  you  have  changed 
your  zone. 

The  old  journey  of  forty  days  you  will  have  passed  in  a  single 
night,  and  while  asleep.  You  have  gone  by  an  empire  of  farming 
lands,  all  destined  to  immediate  occupation,  and  some  of  them  now 
worth  per  acre  considerably  more  than  Napoleon  got  for  a  county 
when  he  sold  it  to  us.  You  have  passed  some  thirty-odd  thriving 
towns,  some  of  them  daily-paper  and  electric-light  and  water-works 
cities,  and  each  with  a  "  boom  "  or  a  prospect  of  one.  There  have 
been,  besides,  some  hundreds  of  thousands  of  spotted  cattle  that 
have  taken  the  place  of  the  bison,  and  the  homes  of  more  than  a 
third  of  a  million  of  prosperous  and  contented  people,  with  all  that 
belongs  to  a  civilization  that  in  its  rapid  development  is  more  like 
a  dream  than  any  chapter  ever  before  written  in  the  history  of 
civilization. 

You  can  have  caught  but  a  glimpse,  but  it  is,  perhaps,  sufficient 
to  impress  the  stranger  to  these  scenes  with  a  new  idea  of  his 
country  and  its  possibilities,  and  with  the  fact  of  how  easy  the  slow 
and  painful  processes  of  civilization  may  become  with  steam  as  a 
pioneer.  Also  a  realization,  more  or  less  vivid,  of  the  folly  of 
adopting  the  Chinese  idea  of  a  region  because  it  is  not  one's  own 
Flowery  Kingdom,  elsewhere  in  an  Eastern  State. 


Santa  F6  Route  traverses  only  the  southeastern  corner  of 

(®  Colorado.  COOLIDGE  is  the  last  town  in  Kansas,  469  miles 
from  the  Missouri.  Seventy-five  miles  west  of  the  State  line,  in 
Colorado,  and  555  miles  from  the  Missouri,  at  about  half-past  eight 
in  the  morning,  we  arrive  at  the  first  distinctively  Spanish  name, 
and  also  at  breakfast. 

LA  JUNTA  (La  HoontaJi)  means  The  Junction.  The  name  is  not 
very  felicitously  chosen,  as  it  also  means  the  coming  together  of  a 
body  of  men,  such  as  a  legislature  or  the  city  council.  But  it  will 
do.  It  is  a  little  town  apparently  in  a  valley,  but  it  has  an  elevation 
of  4,061  feet.  The  mountains  lie  just  beyond,  over  the  hill  as  it 
were,  and  PIKE'S  PEAK  is  north  of  us  some  ninety  miles. 

The  cottonwoods  and  gray  stream  one  sees  are  still  those  of  the 
Arkansas,  and  this  is  the  last  glimpse  of  the  stream  beside  which  we 
have  been  for  the  past  twelve  hours,  and  on  whose  banks  we  may 
be  said  to  have  slept.  Its  small  beginnings  amid  mountain  snows 
are  still  many  a  mile  away. 

La  Junta  is  not  a  romantic  spot,  and  exists  chiefly  for  railroad — 
and,  from  appearances,  for  "saloon" — purposes.  .Here  is  where 
trains  are  made  up.  Travelers  for  the  mountain  resorts  of  Colo- 
rado, and  for  Pueblo  and  Denver,  have  their  cars  shunted  off  to  the 
northward  among  the  foothills  of  the  eastern  slope  of  the  Rockies, 
or  to  take  the  Colorado  Midland  road  for  the  direction  of  Salt  Lake 
and  Ogden,  while  those  who,  like  ourselves,  are  content  with  nothing 
less  than  the  Pacific  coast  direct,  are  trundled  away  to  the  south- 
westward  behind  a  monster  called  a  "  Mogul  "  engine,  who  backs 
himself  up  the  track  and  joins  the  procession  with  a  snap. 

(49) 


~>'  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

While  we  are  waiting  it  may  do  no  harm  to  enquire  into  some  of 
the  facts  of  the  State  of  Colorado. 

To  make  up  Colorado,  parts  of  Kansas,  Nebraska,  Utah  and  New 
Mexico  were  taken.  The  land,  like  Kansas,  was  acquired  partly  by 
conquest  and  partly  by  purchase.  Some  of  it  came  from  Mexico,  and 
some  of  it  was  included  in  the  Napoleon  Bonaparte  real  estate  deal. 

Colorado  was  admitted  to  the  Union  July,  1876,  and  is  fondly 
known  as  the  "Centennial  "  State. 

In  history  she  is  a  partaker  with  all  her  far-western  sisters  who 
were  subjects  of  Spanish  rule,  and  has  about  the  same  musty  histori- 
cal facts,  though  not  so  many  of  them,  to  her  credit.  The  Spaniards 
wandered  among  her  canyons  more  than  three  hundred  years  ago, 
looking  for  the  gold  that,  like  that  of  California,  seems  through  a 
singular  course  of  events  to  have  been  mostly  reserved  for  the 
Saxon. 

The  first  American  explorer  was  Major  Zebulon  M.  Pike,  who 
came  so  long  ago  as  1806,  and  has  a  monument  which  will  stand  in 
perpetual  commemoration  of  his  name  ; — Pike's  Peak. 

Colonel  Long,  and  still  later  John  C.  Fremont,  made  expeditions 
through  Colorado  and  across  the  mountains. 

About  1858  gold  was  discovered  in  what  is  now  Gilpin  County,  a 
few  miles  from  where  Denver  now  stands.  This  gave  great  celebrity 
to  the  monument  of  Major  Pike,  and  "  Pike's  Peak  or  Bust "  passed 
into  history  as  the  watchword  of  western  pluck. 

Colorado  has  an  East  and  West  length  of  380  miles,  and  is  280 
miles  from  North  to  South.  It  is  in  form,  like  so  many  of  the  newer 
States,  almost  a  perfect  parallelogram.  There  are  thirty-three  coun- 
ties; they  being  very  large;  with  an  area  of  104,500  square  miles,  or 
66,880,000  acres. 

There  may  be  said  to  be  three  natural  divisions  of  the  State; — the 
mountain  ranges,  occupying  the  central  portion  from  North  to  South, 
the  foothills,  and  the  plains.  There  are  three  generally  parallel 
ranges  of  mountains,  with  intervening  plateaux  generally  known  as 


COLORADO. 


51 


"parks."  These  last  are  a  special  feature  of  the  State.  They  lie  at 
an  elevation  of  nine  or  ten  thousand  feet,  are  almost  surrounded  by 
high  mountains,  and  are  beautiful  to  the  eye  and  rich  agriculturally. 
About  one-third  of  the  area  of  the  State  is  plains.  They  lie  in 
the  eastern  part,  and  are  the  steep  western  edge  of  the  great 
central  plain  which  the  traveler  from  the  east  has  just  crossed. 

The  further  west  one  goes,  the 
steeper  becomes  the  plains-slope 
until  the  foot-hills  appear. 


A  Colorado  Beginning. 

The  character  of  Colorado  as  a  mountain  resort  is  well  known, 
Beauty  of  sky  and  scene,  purity  of  air,  equability  of  temperature, 
have  been  written  of  to  the  extent  of  scores  of  volumes — thousands 
of  pages. 

Formerly  the  country  was  exclusively  devoted  to  mining,  and 
undoubtedly  is  excedingly  rich  in  mineral  resources.  But  of  later 
years  she  has  been  discovered  to  possess  very  valuable  agricultural 
resources.  The  farming  area  is  not  extensive,  but  what  is  raised  is 
of  the  best.  Colorado  wheat,  vegetables  and  beef  have  a  character 
of  their  own.  Dairy  products  are  a  special  feature.  These  interests 


52  OVERLAND  (,1'IDE 

will  all  grow,  and  even  now  make  an  aggregate  showing  much  better 
than  that  of  some  States  that  have  no  resources  other  than  agri- 
cultural. 

Southern  Colorado  seems  to  have  been  about  the  northern  limit  of 
Spanish  occupancy.  They  crept  up  the  fine  valley  of  the  Purgatoire 
(Voyageur  for  "  Purgatory"; — vernacular,  "Picket-wire") — to  Trini- 
dad (La  Trinidad— "  The  Trinity"),  and  still  further  to  LAS  AM 
MAS  ("  The  Souls").  The  river  also  takes  that  name  among  the 
Mexicans,  probably  from  the  habitual,  and  perhaps  very  proper, 
association  in  the  Spanish  mind  of  Purgatory  and  Souls.*  Where  the 
Purgatoire  enters  the  Arkansas,  at  the  old  Mexican  town  of  Las 
Animas,  on  the  verge  of  the  plains,  their  northern  occupation 
stopped. 

RLO  is  also  one  of  the  old  places  ;  an  extreme  frontier  village 
of  the  Mexican  civilization.  About  this  latitude  the  Indian  occu- 
pancy began;  the  Apaches,  worst  of  all  Indians,  held  the  ground, 
with  other  tribes  almost  as  bad,  to  the  Missouri. 

Thirty  years  ago  this  Indian  occupancy  was  complete,  and  ten 
years  later  it  was  still  unsuccessfully  disputed.  This  was  the  south- 
western boundary  of  it.  A  few  miles  west  of  La  Junta,  on  the 
north  side  of  the  Arkansas,  we  can  see  from  the  car-windows  one 
of  the  mementoes  of  that  time.  This  is  BENT'S  FORT.  It  was 
famous  in  its  time.  The  straggling  line  of  dug-outs,  log  huts, 
covered  wagons,  and  tents  that  marked  the  then  frontier,  was  away 
behind  it.  As  skirmishers  preceding  the  line  of  civilization,  the 
gaunt,  adventurous,  nervy,  desperate  American  frontiersmen  pushed 
up  the  valley  of  the  Arkansas.  They  were  further  advanced  here 
than  at  other  parts  of  the  line  because  this  valley  was  a  favorite 
trail,  and  not  because  they  were  making  farms  and  homes  in  it,  as 
has  since  occurred.  The  occupants  of  Bent's  Fort  were  hunters  by 
predilection.  They  loved  the  wilderness,  and  never  returned  to 
civilization.  They  were  fur-hunters  and  Indian  traders  and  Indian 

•  Lot  Ankmat  Perdidat  is  probably  the  original  Spanish  name. 


COLORADO. 


53 


fighters  at  the  same  time.  They  kept  no  records  ;  they  did  not 
care.  The  American  history  they  were  making  never  got  into  any 
books.  They  were  intolerant  and  savage-tempered  men,  despera- 
does on  a  pinch,  every  one.  Their  ranks  were  recruited  by  fugi- 
tives from  justice.  Life  was  held  very  cheap.  They  were  so  atfcus- 
tomed  to  the  law  of  self-defense  that  it  was  second  nature  to  them. 
They  hated  Indians,  and  doubtless  with  reason,  for  it  is  undoubt- 
edly true  that  all  who  have  lived  among  them  do  hate  them  unless,  as 
often  has  happened,  they  were  so  bad  themselves  that  they  could 
not  live  even  among  their  desperate  white  companions. 


A  Colorado  Ranch. 

At  Bent's  Fort  a  sod  wall,  thick  and  high,  enclosed  about  an  acre. 
There  never  was  a  more  terrible  acre  of  ground.  It  was  full  of 
the  most  reckless  men  ever  gathered  in  one  spot.  Every  one  of 
them  was,  in  our  conception,  a  murderer.  They  had  a  different  idea 
of  crime.  They  gambled,  they  got  drunk,  they  fought  Indians, 
they  stole  stock,  and  they  "traded."  The  man  Bent  was  the  recog- 
nized head  of  them,  and  was  afterward  the  first  American  Gov- 
ernor of  New  Mexico.  The  commercial  idea  was  probably  predom- 
inant, for  everything  was  kept  for  sale  there.  The  place  was  in  the 
midst  of  a  great  buffalo  range,  and  around  it  Apache,  Cheyenne, 


•>t  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

Comanche  and  Pawnee  gathered  and  hunted  and  fought.  They  used, 
when  lacking  a  quarrel  among  themselves,  to  attack  the  fort.  They 
charged  the  wall  on  horseback.  They  never  captured  it,  but  if  one 
should  visit  those  ruins  now  he  might  be  sure  that  he  was  standing 
upon  ground  that  had  been  repeatedly  soaked  with  human  blood. 

All  down  the  valley,  so  peaceful  now,  it  was  the  same  thing. 
Hostile  tribes  met  in  sight  of  the  place,  and  fought  it  out  almost 
under  its  walls.  The  great  battle  between  the  Sioux  from  the  Black 
Hills  and  the  Pawnees  began  close  to  Bent's  Fort,  and  did  not  end 
until  both  sides  had  fought  their  way  down  to  what  is  now  Pawnee 
Rock,  in  Barton  County,  Kansas,  which  was  passed  at  about  ten 
o'clock  p.  M. 

Mr.  Frank  Wilkeson  gives  the  following  graphic  picture  of  the 
doings  of  which  Bent's  Fort  was  the  nucleus.  It  affords  a  glimpse 
of  those  old  times  which  have  so  far  gone  that  no  thought  is  ever 
given  them.  Boone,  apd  the  settlement  of  Kentucky  and  Indiana. 
have  more  or  less  passed  into  history.  All  this,  as  bloody  and  as 
interesting,  is  curiously  left  out. 

"  As  emigration  increased  on  the  Arkansas  trail,  Bent's  Fort  became  an  important 
place.  United  States  troops,  marching  to  the  Southeastern  Territories,  camped 
there,  and  frequently  secured  guides  from  the  post.  Thousands  of  dollars'  worth  of 
goods  were  sold  annually.  Enterprising  young  men  bought  goods  at  Bent's  and 
loaded  them  onto  their  pack  animals.  Then  they  rode  North,  South,  West,  in 
search  of  Indian  camps,  which  they  entered  and  there  traded  with  savage  custom- 
ers. The  peddlers  of  the  plains  traded  only  for  the  more  valuable  furs.  They 
penetrated  into  the  remote  recesses  of  the  Rocky  Mountains.  They  crossed  that 
mighty  snow-capped  range  and  drummed  up  trade  in  then  unnamed  valleys  where 
unknown  Indians  lived.  These  men  acquired  trading  routes  along  certain  trails  and 
jealously  defended  them  against  all  intruders.  They  recklessly  entered  all  the  Indian 
villages  they  discovered.  In  time,  if  they  were  not  shot  or  burned,  they  became 
widely  known  among  the  Indians,  and  were  welcomed  and  trusted.  They  sup- 
plied the  warriors  with  powder  and  lead  and  percussion  caps.  They  also  dealt  in 
traps,  bright-colored  cloth,  beads,  knives,  axes,  fishhooks,  buttons  and  brass  wire. 
Many  of  these  traders  married  Indian  women,  and  from  these  unions  sprang  the 
iialf-breeds — dangerous  men  in  whom  the  courage  of  their  fathers  was  supple- 


COLORADO.  55 

mented  by  the  crafty  treachery  of  their  mothers.  Some  of  the  white  traders, 
especially  in  the  Rocky  Mountain  region,  adopted  the  dress  and  habits  of  the 
Indians,  and  frequently  became  men  of  consequence  in  the  tribes. 

"  Other  men,  lured  from  the  bloody  frontier  by  hope  of  profitable  barter  or  love 
of  adventure,  or  who  sincerely  desired  to  put  a  greater  distance  between  themselves 
and  pursuing  sheriffs,  loaded  wagons  with  goods  and  drove  westward  to  the  buffalo 
range,  expecting  to  meet  wandering  tribes  of  Indians.  They  were  careless  whether 
they  met  Sioux,  Cheyennes,  Crows  or  Blackfeet.  These  men  generally  traveled  in 
groups  of  three  or  four,  each  driving  a  team  of  horses,  behind  which  rolled  a 
heavily-loaded  wagon.  Today  they  traded  with  Sioux;  tomorrow  they  met  Coman- 
che  braves;  the  next  day  painted  and  blanketed  Cheyenne  warriors  crowded  around 
their  wagons  and  exchanged  furs  for  powder,  balls,  blankets  and  hardware.  Or, 
today  they  fought,  and  tomorrow  their  corpses  lay  blackening  in  the  sun,  and' 
glossy  ravens  perched  on  their  scalpless  heads  and  plucked  their  eyes,  and  foul 
buzzards  stalked  around  them  and  prairie  wolves  tore  them  to  pieces.  Their  goods 
were  scattered  throughout  the  villages,  and  their  scalps,  suspended  from  sticks 
thrust  in  the  ground  at  the  entrance  of  lodges,  waved  in  the  wind,  and  little  Indian 
children  spat  on  them  as  they  played." 

Long  after  the  times  spoken  of  above,  the  plains  Indians  contin- 
ued strong  and  defiant.  In  November,  1864,  what  is  called  the 
"  Chivington  Massacre"  occurred,  on  Sand  Creek,  not  far  from  the 
site  of  Bent's  Fort,  and  on  the  old  fighting  ground  of  the  tribes. 
Chivington  was  a  Colorado  colonel,  and  his  action  was  alternately 
condemned  and  defended. 

As  late  as  the  Summer  of  1867,  after  railroads  had  begun  to  be 
built,  and  when  10,000  children  attended  Sunday-school  in  Kansas, 
there  was  an  Indian  raid  in  what  is  now  a  thickly  settled  portion  of 
the  State.  Still  later  a  Kansas  governor  resigned  to  take  command 
of  a  battalion  of  Kansas  militia,  and  went  into  the  field.  The  same 
Summer  General  Custer  lost  sixty  men  in  a  fight  with  Indians  on  the 
Republican  River,  in  what  is  now  Republican  County. 

On  September  17,  1868,  Col.  G.  A.  Forsyth,  a  soldier  of  the  war 
and  a  skillful  fighter,  was  surrounded  by  Indians  on  the  North 
Fork  of  the  Republican,  probably  in  what  is  now  Jewell  County, 
and  remained  so  for  eight  days.  He  was  almost  mortally 


M 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


wounded,    and    lost   several  men   and    officers,   among   whom   was 
Lieut.  F.  H.  Beecher. 

This  seems  not  to  have  been  the  last  of  the  Indian  exploits  in 
this  bloody  raid,  though  its  details  are  among  the  most  thrilling  in 
the  annals  of  frontier  warfare.  In  the  Summer  of  1869  they  were 
still  raiding  Kansas.  These  were  expiring  throes.  By  that  time 


the  railroads,  farm-making  and  popu- 
lation had  advanced  to  an  extent  in- 
compatible with  Indian  hostilities. 
Only  the  perpetual  and  deathless  de- 
sire for  revenge  could  have  brought 

them  about.     They  were  entirely  useless  and  hopeless  a.s  attempts 
to  recover  lost  territory  or  stop  the  fateful  march  of  civilization. 

LA  JUNTA  marks  the  shore  of  a  new  order   of  civilization;  the 
oldest  of  the  continent.     Here  begin  the  swarthy  faces,  the  curious 


COLORADO.  57 

dress,  the  adobe  dwellings,  the  laden  donkeys,  the  huge  and 
ironless  carts,  the  curiously  yoked  oxen,  the  plows  made  of  crooked 
sticks,  the  growth  of  crops  by  irrigation,  the  Catholic  faith  and  the 
Spanish  tongue.  We  shall  see  greatly  more  of  all  these  un-Ameri- 
can things  as  we  go  westward,  and  with  them  a  still  older  and  stranger 
civilization;  that  of  the  Pueblos. 

Amid  varying  scenes,  and  upon  a  track  that,  without  any  refer- 
ence to  sacred  poetry,  may  be  called  a  devious  way,  we  pass  most  of 
the  forenoon.  The  difficulties  of  nature  are  obviously  increasing, 
and  during  this  forenoon  we  shall  climb  about  three  thousand  feet. 
Magnificent  glimpses  of  mountains  are  just  before,  and  there  is 
rock,  canyon  and  pine  on  either  hand.  A  rushing  stream  is  occa- 
sionally passed,  and  plow-land  is  one  of  the  things  of  the  past,  away 
back  beyond  the  western  edge  of  Kansas.  What  few  houses  one 
sees  remind  one  of  things  noted  in  desultory  readings  about  Pales- 
tine, and,  indeed,  there  is  a  relationship  between  them  as  near  as 
that  usually  existing  between  Irish  cousins.  The  style  of  the  Mexi- 
can house  is  of  Eastern  origin.  It  came  to  Spain  with  the  Moor, 
and  from  Spain  hither. 

Before  noon  we  reach  TRINIDAD.  The  old  town,  the  Mexican 
Trinidad,  is  not  visible  from  the  station.  It  is  spoiled  by  civilization, 
•even  if  it  could  be  seen,  and  is  not  recognizable  by  the  visitor  of 
fifteen  years  ago.  It  seemed  then  to  have  an  air  which  it  has  now 
lost.  Beside  its  brawling  stream  ;  Mexican,  and  not  a  mixture;  sur- 
rounded by  beautiful  mountains,  with  an  air  that  was  balm;  after 
three  months  of  the  hot  breezes  of  the  plains,  it  seemed  a  haven  of 
rest.  And  the  worst  of  the  plains  came  last,  for  there  is  not  a  more 
God-forsaken  tract  of  soil  in  the  whole  journey  from  Westport  to 
the  mountains  than  that  which  lies  between  what  is  now  La  Junta 
and  Trinidad. 

The  flat-top  mountain  which  seems  so  near,  beyond  the  town,  and 
which  changes  its  aspect  curiously  as  seen  from  different  points,  is 
FISHER'S  PEAK.  It  is  named  for  a  pioneer. 


(58) 


COLORADO.  59 

On  the  right,  going  west,  there  is  a  yellow  cliff  rising  brokenly  to 
a  height  of  some  five  or  six  hundred  feet.  Good  eyes  and  close 
scrutiny  will  enable  one  to  see  upon  this  an  upright  monument. 
Another  of  the  old  settlers  chose  to  be  buried  there.  The  top  of  the 
cliff  was  the  scene  of  an  Indian  siege  during  his  lifetime,  in  which 
he  took  an  enforced,  but  prominent,  part,  and  when  he  died  he  was 
carried  thither. 

It  is  at  Trinidad  that  we  really  begin  to  climb.  It  is  twenty  miles 
to  the  Raton  (Rah-/<w: — "  a  mouse")  tunnel,  and  there  are  more 
than  sixteen  hundred  feet  to  climb  in  those  twenty  miles. 

RATON  TUNNEL  is  an  elongated  perforation  through  the  back- 
bone of  the  continent.  But  this  "  backbone,"  so  often  mentioned  in 
contemporaneous  literature,  is  a  desultory  bit  of  geography  and  is 
scattered  about  over  a  vast  extent  of  country,  and  occurs  in  places 
hundreds  of  miles  apart.  This  is  one  of  the  most  prominent  pro- 
cesses of  the  continental  spine,  and  you  come  as  near  its  exact 
location  as  you  can  at  any  one  place  on  a  journey  that  certainly 
does  get  around  or  over  the  vertebral  column  somewhere. 

Around  Trinidad  lies  one  of  the  best  and  most  extensive  anthra- 
cite coal-beds  of  the  country.  You  may  see  the  coke-ovens  smoking 
in  the  daytime  and  glowing  at  night,  any  time  of  the  year.  This 
railroad  has  had  great  luck  at  striking  coal-beds.  It  has  them  in 
Kansas  ;  extensive  ones  in  the  mountains  just  beyond  La  Junta  ; 
here  ;  on  the  other  side  of  the  tunnel  near  Blossburg;  and  conven- 
iently strung  along  the  line  almost  to  El  Paso  on  one  hand  and  Cali- 
fornia on  the  other.  Considering  the  frantic  coughing  of  two 
enormous  engines,  the  clouds  of  smoke,  the  dribbling  sand  and  the 
very  perceptible  slant,  you  will  conclude  that  coal  in  considerable 
quantity  is  needed  just  about  here. 

While  the  train  is  toiling  up  the  steepest  portion  of  the  grade  just 
east  of  the  tunnel,  if  the  day  be  fair  you  will  find  it  to  be  worth  the 
trouble  to  look  backward.  At  a  certain  point  you  will  see  rising  up 
-out  of  the  immensity  a  vision  that  has  often  been  declared  worth  the 


60  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

journey  thus  far;  an  almost  unreal  and  unearthly  panorama  of  pale 
blue  mountains  flecked  with  white  against  a  sky  as  blue  as  sapphire. 
The  pines  and  canyons  of  the  lower  regions  lie  between.  Over  all 
hangs  a  haze  so  thin  and  so  ethereal  that  it  gives  to  the  momentary 
picture  the  semblance  of  a  scene  out  of  some  gigantic  fairy-land. 

There  is  something  in  the  mountain  scenery  of  these  regions  that 
impresses  every  man.  But  it  can  not  be  put  into  words,  and  has 
never  yet  been  either  painted  or  described.  Nothing  but  actual 
presence  will  answer,  and  then,  on  a  railroad  train,  there  is  but  a 
glimpse.  One  can  but  sit  at  a  window  and  take  in  the  general  sen- 


A  Glance  Backward. 

sations.  Then,  after  going  over  the  same  route  a  score  of  times, 
one  will  continually  be  finding  something  new,  and  be  smitten  with 
a  species  of  remorse  because  he  was  so  stupid  as  never  to  have  seen 
it  before.  Much  of  the  best  is  unfortunately  passed  in  the  night. 
The  railroad  waits  for  no  man  as  a  rule,  and  when  it  does  it  usually 
happens  in  an  uninteresting  place.  No  rhapsodies  will  be  indulged 
in  here.  They  seem  puerile  when  compared  with  the  actual  scene. 
The  skies  of  these  New  Mexican  and  Arizona  regions  alone  are 
enough  to  furnish  occupation.  Perhaps  there  is  nothing  like  them 
elsewhere  in  the  beautiful  world. 


COLORADO.  61 

Raton  Tunnel  is  7,622  feet  above  sea-level.  It  is  nearly  a  mile 
through  it,  and  it  continues  to  be  up-grade  to  the  middle  of  it,  and 
then  it  is  downwards  for  the  rest  of  the  way.  When  you  enter  the 
darkness  of  the  eastern  end  you  are  in  Colorado.  When  in  the 

.  course  of  a  few  minutes  you  emerge  into  daylight  at  the  opposite 
end,  you  are  in  New  Mexico. 

Just  before  entering  the  tunnel  one  may  see  on  the  mountain-side 
above  certain  apparently  prehistoric  remains.  They  are  those  of 
the  "  switchback,"  by  means  of  which  trains  were  taken  over  the 
mountains  while  the  tunnel  was  building.  One  would  think  from 
the  indifference  with  regard  to  it  of  those  who  built  it  and  all  the 
rest  of  the  line,  that  a  "  switchback  "  over  the  narrow  crest  of  the 
Raton  Mountain,  and  all  the  other  engineering  feats  in  the  neigh- 
borhood of  the  backbone,  were  the  commonest  things  in  life.  In 
truth  they  are  not.  Only  absolute  necessity  invented  them  in  the 
later  years.  The  modest  men  of  the  times  are  the  civil  engineers. 
They  have  builded,  to  stand  a  thousand  years,  some  of  the  most 
astonishing  of  all  the  monuments  of  human  genius,  perseverance 
and  energy,  and  you  can  not  even  get  them  to  talk  about  it.  Some 
of  them  were  fighters,  too,  and  knew  how  to  march  and  camp  and 
watch  as  well  as  any  trained  soldier.  They  did  not  leave  behind 
them  a  trail  of  desolation,  but  of  progress,  industry  and  lasting  ben- 
efit to  the  country  and  the  world. 

It  is,  as  is  not  unusual  in  human  affairs,  laard  to  get  up  at  Raton 

'  Pass,  but  it  is  still  harder,  in  this  case,  to  get  down.  There  was  an 
engine  to  pull,  and  one  to  push,  in  the  ascent,  and  there  is  now  one 
Titanic  monster  exercising  his  utmost  endeavor  in  what  an  engine 
does  not  like  to  do — holding  back.  There  is  often  a  thick  smoke 
which  makes  one  imagine  there  must  be  a  hot  box; — several  of  them. 
But  there  is  not  ;  it  is  hot  tires.  The  brake-shoes  have  made  the 
rims  of  all  the  wheels  hot  enough  to  burn  the  oil  with  which  the 
surface  of  every  car-wheel  gets  coated,  and  the  resultant  smoke 
suggests  a  smouldering  conflagration. 


H-J  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

Observing  these  things  one  wonders  how  this  and  other  steep 
grades  could  be  descended  without  the  aid  of  the  air-brake.  No 
stalwart  brakeman,  with  a  pick-handle  thrust  into  the  spokes  of  the 
brake-wheel,  could  hold  the  shoes  to  the  tires  with  force  enough  to 
make  them  all  hot,  and  yet  loosely  enough  to  permit  the  wheels  to 
turn.  It  is  all  done  now  by  the  engineer,  with  his  thumb  and 
finger  on  a  brass  cock.  There  are  many  contingencies  for  nervous 
people  to  think  of,  but  an  accident  has  never  happened.  It  reminds 
one  of  the  curious  fact  that  there  is  greatly  more  danger  in  riding 
from  your  house  to  the  depot  in  a  hack,  or  even  in  walking,  than 
there  is  in  the  whole  of  the  journey  from  the  Missouri  to  Los 
.Angeles  or  San  Francisco. 


El  Llano  Estacado. 

Hut  we  seem  to  have  quite  lost  sight  of  that  suggestive  TK  AIL  with 
which  we  started  out.  Well,  it  is  here,  more  prominently  than  ever. 
A>  you  toil  up  the  grade  east  of  the  tunnel,  you  may  see  a  house, 
built  of  adobe  and  once  plastered,  but  now  troubled  with  an  eruptive 
complaint  and  looking  patchy,  down  in  the  canyon  to  the  right. 
This  was  once  the  place  where  toll  was  collected  for  that  part  of  the 
trail  which  was  a  road  winding  through  Raton  Pass.  The  man  to 
whom  it  was  a  source  of  revenue  still  resides  there,  with  his  occupa- 
tion as  far  gone  as  ever  Othello's  was.  The  old  track  is  still  visible 
beside  his  house,  but  there  is  no  toll  to  speak  of.  Through  this 
narrow  notch  in  the  mountains  has  screeched  many  an  ox-drawn 


COLORADO.  63 

cart  laden  with  goods  from  Westport,  or  Independence,  or  Lex- 
ington, or  Leavenworth.  It  seems  worth  while  to  try  to  think  how 
slowly,  according  to  modern  ideas,  we  have  come  thus  far,  and  then 
endeavor  to  substitute  for  our  twenty-eight  hours,  or  less,  the  old- 
fashioned  four  months.  Not  four  months  of  sitting  upon  red  mohair, 
either. 

The  first  merchandise  coming  by  this  famous  route  was  sent  all  the 
way  from  Kaskaskia,  Illinois,  and  as  far  back  as  1804.  From  1822 
to  1856,  it  was  an  almost  continuous  traffic,  interrupted  only  by 
Indian  raids  and  our  difficulties  with  Mexico.  In  1846  the  value  of 
the  goods  carried  across  the  plains  and  mountains  was  $1,752,250. 
The  sum  does  not  seem  large  by  modern  standards,  but  it  required 
a  good  deal  of  toil  with  the  means  then  at  hand  to  do  as  much,  and 
the  trail  must  have  been  a  scene  of  camps  from  end  to  end.  This 
traffic  employed  a  large  number  of  men,  who  became  professional  in 
it,  and  could  fight  Indians,  find  water  and  feed,  take  all  the  chances 
of  the  wilderness,  and  make  the  round  trip  within  a  few  hours  of  a 
given  number  of  days. 

Ami  there  was  still  another  road.  It  left  the  main  trail  somewhere 
near  where  the  western  line  of  Kansas  now  is,  and  turned  southward 
across  a  place, —  a  vast  country,  in  fact, —  the  very  name  of  which 
was  a  synonym  of  danger  before  civilization  came,  and  which  is  still 
almost  unexplored.  For  this  nearer  trail  to  El  Paso,  and  the  City 
of  Mexico  may  also  be  includecl,  lay  across  EL  LLANO  ESTACADO 
( }W/no  Aistah^tfdo, — The  Staked  Plain),  and  was  in  all  likelihood  the 
very  dreariest  road  ever  traveled.  The  distances  were  immense,  and 
must  be  made.  Water  was  not  plentiful,  and  Comanches  were.  It  had 
its  name  from  the  fact  that  the  early  Spaniards — priests,  they  say — 
had  taken  pains  to  mark  the  first  route  with  stakes,  so  that  others 
might  come  and  they  return. 

Well,  it  is  still  "  The  Staked  Plain,"  for  it  has  been  staked  again, 
this  time  not  by  Spaniards,  and  presumably  not  by  priests.  Starting 
from  a  point  on  the  lines  in  Southern  Kansas,  the  Santa  F6  Route 

5 


64 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


has  already  built  southwestward  to  the  verge  of  this  dreadful  coun- 
try, and  will  eventually  cross  it.  More  than  this,  it  is,  like  the  Kansas, 
"desert," — not  so  bad  as  believed.  There  is  nothing,  no  miracle, 
that  can  so  quickly  change  a  country  as  the  advent  of  a  railroad. 
Men  of  this  generation  will  live  to  see  this  paradise  of  the  Comanche 
and  the  coyote,  this  hideous  wilderness,  this  unknown  dread,  covered 
with  settlements  and  rich  in  spotted  herds. 

The  northeastern  boundary  of  the  old  Llano  Estacado  is  what  is. 
known  as  the  PAN-HAN 


PAN-HANDLE  ©F 


aside  from  the  narrative  of  any  overland  journey,  the 
J®  PAN-HANDLE  is  so  curious  a  combination  of  frontier  barbar- 
ism and  growing  civilization  (besides  being  accessible  by  the  same 
lines  of  railroad),  that  a  brief  sketch  of  it  is  inserted  here. 

It  is  the  extreme  northwestern  corner  of  the  LONE  STAR  STATE. 
It  is  bigger  than  all  the  New  England  States  with  New  Jersey  added. 
It  is  practically,  so  far,  a  region  without  law ;  it  is  a  law  unto  itself. 
Its  remote  and  peculiar  population  pay  little  or  no  attention  to  the 
Texas  Legislature,  or  Courts,  or  Governor,  or  Sheriff.  The  only 
means  of  reaching  them  is  to  send  a  company  of  the  Rangers  into 
the  region.  This  body  of  troops  is  under  State  pay,  and  regularly 
enlisted.  They  go  in  squads  or  companies,  are  fighters  to  a  man, 
and  command  respect  even  in  the  Pan-Handle.  There  is  nothing 
to  hinder  the  whole  of  the  six  companies  of  Rangers  being  sent 
there  at  one  time.  If  they  should  come,  that  which  they  were  look- 
ing for  would  very  probably  be  found.  So,  when  a  squad  of  them 
makes  its  appearance,  there  are  others  who  go.  Cattle  are  left  to 
take  care  of  themselves.  No-Mans-Land,  Colorado,  New  Mexico 
and  southern  Kansas  have  some  distinguished  visitors  who  come  on 
horseback. 

Within  the  confines  of  the  Pan-Handle  are  mountains,  rivers, 
lakes,  deep  gorges,  cliffs,  heavy  timber,  rich  farming  lands,  and  un- 
counted miles  of  rolling  prairie.  If  the  country  were  not  fairly  well 
watered  it  could  not  be  used  for  its  present  purposes,  for  it  is  the 
home  of  the  Cattle  Barons. 

This  is  a  picturesque  character.  He  is  an  Arab  by  custom  and 
instinct.  But  he  is  a  Bedouin  without  being  a  Moslem,  and  he  has 

(65) 


66 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


no  religion.  He  fears  not  God  or  the  devil,  and  man  only  when  the 
man  is  a  Texas  Ranger.  Under  his  rule  there  has  grown  up  in  the 
Pan-Handle  an  anomalous  condition  of  society  which  has  never 
been  known  elsewhere.  The  term  "  Baron "  is  not  entirely  mis- 


Woman's  Rights  in  the  Pan-Handle. 

applied.  He  is  still,  notwithstanding  the  changes  taking  place  since 
the  country  has  been  penetrated  by  the  railroad,  the  sworn  enemy  of 
the  man  with  the  plow.  He  had,  and  still  often  has,  a  small  army  of 
retainers,  from  thirty  to  two  hundred,  all  armed  to  the  teeth,  and  all 
believing  in  his  right  to  all  he  claimed,  which  was,  almost  literally, 


PAN-HANDLE   OF   TEXAS.  67 

the  earth.  The  Baron  did  not,  and  still  does  not,  own  any  of  this 
vast  territory.  He  divided  the  country  up  with  his  lordly  neigh- 
bors, and  they  made  common  cause.  They  kept  everybody  else  out. 
They  would  not  permit  settlers  to  come.  They  paid  nothing  for  the 
use  of  the  land,  and  never  intended  to.  When  they  wished  they 
fenced  it.  There  was  no  difficulty  in  finding  men  who  owned  fifty 
thousand  head  of  cattle,  claiming  of  absolute  right  the  "  range  "  they 
had  seized  upon  for  them,  thousands  upon  thousands  of  acres.  Their 
ranch-houses  were  arsenals;  their  liegemen  were  armed  retainers. 
It  was,  and  in  many  cases  still  is,  a  complete  baronial  establishment. 

All  this  time  this  unique  system  of  armed  communism  was  as 
much  in  defiance  of  all  law  as  though  there  were  no  Texas,  and  no 
United  States.  These  men  refused  to  pay  taxes,  refused  to  pay  rent 
for  the  land  they  occupied,  refused  to  appeal  to  the  State  courts  for 
any  wrong  done  or  suffered  within  the  confines  of  the  Pan-Handle, 
and  declined  in  all  respects  to  recognize  the  right  of  the  State  to 
have  anything  to  do  with  them.  They  do  not  vote.  The  Pan- 
Handle  contains  forty-eight  or  fifty  counties.  There  are  thirty-three 
million  acres  of  school-lands,  and  three  million  acres  of  Capitol 
lands  within  its  boundaries.  There  are  also  several  million  acres  of 
alternate  sections  of  lands  granted  to  railroads  for  construction. 
The  cattle  barons  occupy  all  this. 

Sometimes  these  offenders  are  corporations,  the  chief  stockholders 
of  which  reside  in  New  York,  London,  Glasgow,  Paris,  or  Berlin. 
The  State  of  Texas  adopted  a  curious  plan  for  building  a  capitol. 
She  owns  land  in  any  quantity,  for  when  she  entered  the  Union  by 
her  own  volition,  and  by  annexation,  she  retained  possession  of  all 
her  lands.  She  has  a  homestead  law  of  her  own.  A  syndicate  was 
given  three  million  acres  to  build  a  capitol.  This  syndicate  con- 
verted most  of  these  lands  into  a  huge  range.  It  is  already  worth 
ten  millions  of  dollars. 

The  following  story  is  told  by  a  correspondent  of  the  St.  Louis 
Globe-Democrat,  and  is  illustrative  of  the  curious  doings  that  may 


68  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

occur  when  the  "desert"  begins  to  be  redeemed  U>civilization.    The 
of  the  frontier,  never  half  told,  is  a  very  strange  one,  illustra- 
tive c  f  all  the  varieties  of  action  that  may  be  prompted  by  the  bar- 
baric selfishness  of  men: 

"The  largest  range  in  the  Pan-Handle,  perhaps,  is  that  controlled  by  Goodnight  & 
Adair.  This  firm  controls  over  a  million  acres,  and  perhaps  does  not  own  a  thou- 
sand acres  all  told.  Their  chief  ranch  is  the  Palo  Daro,  situated  in  Armstrong 
County,  with  Clarendon,  Donley  County,  as  post-office  town.  The  Palo  Duro 
ranch  embraces  fully  600,000  acres,  and  covers  nearly  all  the  good  pasture  land  in 
Armstrong,  Donley,  Randall,  Briscoe  and  Swisher  Counties.  It  is  fenced  on  the 
west  mostly  by  a  natural  precipice,  on  the  east  with  barbed  wire,  and  on  the  north 
and  south  is  guarded  by  line  riders.  There  are  about  75,000  head  of  cattle  on  this 
ranch.  They  are  fed  almost  exclusively  on  free  grass,  or,  as  it  is  called  in  Texas,  the 
"children's  grass"  Charles  Goodnight  is  the  manager  of  the  ranch.  He  is  a 
strong,  rugged,  fairly  educated  man,  and  enjoys  the  distinction  of  wearing  i 
name.  He  moved  from  Colorado  to  Palo  Duro  canyon,  in  the  Pan-Handle  of  Texas, 
about  the  lime  the  civil  war  broke  out.  Adair,  the  other  member  of  the  hrm,  is  an 
Irishman,  a  landlord  and  an  Orangeman.  He  docs  not  stay  in  Ireland  much,  nor 
docs  he  spend  much  of  his  valuable  time  in  this  country.  He  is  in  a  perennial  row 
with  his  Irish  tenants.  When  the  legislature  of  Texas  passed  the  lease  law,  and 
it  an  offens**  to  inclose  public  lands,  or  private  lands  without  the  consent  of 
the  owner,  the  land  board  called  on  Mr.  Goodnight  to  put  up  six  cents  an  acre  for 
about  500,000  acres  c  f  school  lands  that  his  herds  fed  on,  and  that  his  fences  and 
his  cowboys  held  exclusively  for  his  use  and  benefit.  Goodnight  flatly  refused  to 
put  up.  The  attorney -general  notified  him  that  he  was  violating  the  law  in  main- 
taining fences  around  public  lands.  Goodnight  ignored  the  warning.  The  attor- 
ney-general concluded  that  he  would  make  a  test  case  with  Goodnight,  and  nude 
preparations  to  proceed  to  the  Pan- Handle  and  have  the  cattle  baron  indicted.  Then 
Goodnight  got  in  some  fine  work.  He  had  Armstrong  and  Donley  Counties  organ- 
ized, and,  under  the  law,  certain  other  counties  were  attached  to  them  for  judicial, 
purposes.  The  foreman  of  one  of  his  ranges  was  maJe  sheriff  of  Donley  County, 
and  another  of  his  foremen  was  elected  sheriff  of  Armstrong  County.  Let  it  be 
remembered  that  every  person  residing  in  Armstrong  and  Donley  Counties  were  vas- 
sals of  Goodnight.  His  employes  were  elected  clerks,  assessors,  collectors,  treas- 
urers, school-superintendents,  county  judges  and  county  attorneys.  Goodnight 
took  a  briefless  attorney  from  Mobeetie,  transplanted  him  at  Clarendon,  in  Donley 
County,  and  had  him  elected  district  judge.  When  the  machinery  of  the  law  was 


PAN-HANDLE   OF    TEXAS.  69 

•complete,  court  commenced,  grand  and  petit- jurors  were  summoned,  and  everything 
set  in  motion.  Goodnight  himself  was  made  foreman  of  the  grand-jury.  The 
county  attorney  presented  an  indictment  against  Goodnight  for  maintaining  a  fence 
around  public  land.  The  grand-jury  brought  in  a  true  bill  against  Goodnight — him- 
self, be  it  remembered,  being  the  foreman  and  his  employes  being  members  of  the 
grand-jury — and  he  went  to  trial.  He  was  acquitted,  of  course,  and  a  few  days 
later,  when  the  attorney-general  arrived  at  Clarendon  with  some  costly  counsel  in 
his  train  to  help  him  prosecute  Goodnight,  they  found  they  were  headed  off.  Good- 
night was  tried  and  acquitted  and  could  not  be  placed  in  jeopardy  twice.  The 


attorney-general  stormed  around,  denounced  the  proceeding  as  a  humbug,  but  was 
completely  beaten,  and  narrowly  escaped  being  imprisoned  for  contempt  of  court. 
At  the  last  session  of  the  Texas  legislature  the  house  passed  a  resolution  calling 
upon  the  governor  to  remove  the  judge  from  office  for  this  proceeding,  but  the  sen- 
ate, being  pretty  well  controlled  by  the  cattle  barons  and  other  corporate  influences, 
refused  to  concur  after  a  stormy  debate.  The  judge  is  still  in  office,  and  so  are  the 
other  officers  selected  by  Goodnight  for  his  counties. 

It  is  no  misnomer  to  call  Goodnight  a  baron.     He  is  one  in  reality.      He  owns 
-all    the    school- houses,    all   the    churches,    all    the    buildings    in    Armstrong   and 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

Donley  Counties.  He  maintains  two  school-teachers  and  two  preachers  at  his  own 
expense.  He  does  not  allow  any  liquor  to  be  sold  in  either  of  his  counties,  and 
when  a  cowboy  becomes  obstreperous  he  is  ordered  to  move  out  of  the  barony,  and 
if  he  refuses  Mr.  Goodnight's  sheriff  arrests  or  kills  him  and  Mr.  Goodnight's  judge 
sends  him  to  jail  or  holds  an  inquest  on  him.  Other  of  the  Pan-Handle  barons 
are  now  attempting  to  organize  their  baronies  "  according  to  law  "  a  la  Goodnight, 
but  so  far  have  not  been  very  successful.  Goodnight  has  not  paid  a  cent  of  rent  to- 
the  State  yet.  At  every  legislative  session  an  effort  is  made  to  amend  the  law 
so  that  the  venue  in  suits  for  rent  may  be  changed  from  the  county  where  the 
violations  of  law  occur  to  the  State  capital,  but  Goodnight  and  the  cattle  barons 
have  up  to  this  time  been  strong  enough  to  defeat  it.  As  long  as  the  trial  must 
take  place  in  the  vicinity  it  is  safe  to  say  that  Mr.  Goodnight  and  the  other 
Pan-Handle  barons  will  not  contribute  much  to  the  public  school  fund." 

But  the  old  times  are  passing  away.  The  30,000  nomads  who  now 
inhabit  the  Pan-Handle  must  succumb  to  a  new  power  that  does  not 
enforce  its  edicts  by  writs  and  in  courts ;  the  power  of  immigration, 
the  forerunner  of  which  is  the  locomotive.  The  iron  pioneer  has 
shrieked  the  death-knell  of  lawlessness  wherever  it  has  so  far  gone. 
The  "  Farewell,  festive  cuss !"  of  the  Western  newspapers  must  soon- 
be  said  to  all  the  cowboys.  The  case  of  the  Pan-Handle,  a  rich 
country  that  must  as  certainly  be  settled  by  farmers  as  it  is  certain 
that  it  is  there,  is  up  to  date  a  peculiar  one.  But  it  will  go  with  the 
rest.  Women  will  come.  That  is  the  sign  of  doom.  American 
women  go  to  church.  Preachers  will  come.  Children  will  be  there, 
the  heralds  of  the  little  white  school-houses  that  will  shine  on  the 
hills,  as  they  do  in  Kansas.  The  process  will  be  short,  the  tine 
brief.  It  will  not  be  ten  or  twenty  years,  but  four  or  five.  Those 
who  have  not  seen  the  wonderful  process  have  no  idea  of  the  aston- 
ishing rapidity  with  which  the  wilderness  may  be  transformed. 


O  far  as  its  place 
in  the  history  of 
American  civilization  is 
concerned,  NEW  MEX- 
ICO is  among  the  oldest 
of  the  few  old  things. 
we  have  to  boast  of. 

It  is,  or  it  was  a  very 
few  years  ago,  very  for- 
eign. There  was  not 

in  all  its  mountain  realm  a  single  idea  that  owned  the  least  kinship- 
to  American  advancement.  Spain  had,  by  a  transmigration  as  curi- 
ous as  any  theory  advanced  by  Pythagoras,  transferred  her  Sancho 
Panzas,  with  a  sprinkling  of  Don  Quixotes,  to  this  region.  It  was. 
the  northern  extension  of  the  Latin  empire  established  by  the  con- 

(71) 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

quest  of  Mexico,  which  within  the  memory  of  living  men  existed  in 
full  vigor  on  the  main  land  of  this  continent.  The  place  you  may 
refer  to  on  any  map,  or  on  the  time-table,  called  "  WAGON  MOUND," 
was  the  site  of  a  frontier  Mexican  custom-house,  whose  collections 
were  supposed  to  find  their  way  into  the  national  money-box  in  the 
distant  City  of  Mexico.  Of  course,  in  this  empire  were  included 
California,  most  of  Arizona,  parts  of  Kansas  and  New  Mexico,  and 
all  of  Texas.  A  fact  much  more  curious  than  the  falling  of  these 
vast  possessions  into  the  hands  of  the  foreordained  and  pre- 
destinated Yankee,  is  the  other  fact  that  within  thirty  years  they 
have  become  more  valuable  in  dollars  and  cents,  or  in  escudos  and 
•dobloncs  if  you  will,  than  all  that  is  left  of  Mexico,  with  Old  Spain 
thrown  in. 

Notwithstanding  the  encroachments  of  the  Americans  carried 
hither  by  the  railroads,  New  Mexico  is  still  full  of  nooks  and  corners 
where  eternal  peace  has  her  abiding  place  and  broods  over  the  hum- 
blest arid  happiest  homes  in  America.  In  these,  the  adventurous  wan- 
derer will  still  find  the  cumbrous  carts  with  wooden  wheels,  like  those 
of  the  car  of  Juggernaut,  and  which  it  is  against  the  custom  of  the 
country  and  religious  faith  ever  to  grease.  There,  the  people  still  live 
in  the  homely  and  most  comfortable  poor  men's  houses  ever  known, 
built  of  the  sun-dried  bricks  called  adobe  (ad-r-bay).  There  they 
still  plow  with  the  Egyptian  implement  which  is  little  better  than 
a  sharpened  stick,  and  which  has  come  down  to  them  legitimately, 
and  without  infringement  of  copyright,  from  that  far  Arabia  who 
is  still,  at  this  day,  the  venerable  ancestress  of  more  things  in  New 
Mexico  than  Columbia  is,  prolific  mother  though  she  be. 

These  simple  people  have  another  thing,  of  more  importance  than 
a  plow,  that  is  also  Arabic  or  Spanish,  which  are  interchangeable 
terms.  They  are  courteous;  they  only  require  half-decent  treatment 
at  the  hands  of  the  man  who  habitually  calls  them  "  Greasers,"  and 
who  has  not  so  far  given  them  that,  to  be  found  kindly,  hospitable, 
singularly  intelligent  for  their  circumstances,  and  lacking  so  much 


NEW   MEXICO. 


73 


of  being  barbarians  that  the  graces  of  life  seem  to  have  singularly 
flourished  among  them. 

New  Mexico  is  a  land  of  brilliant  sunshine,  beautiful  mountains, 
valleys  picturesque  and  rich,  blue  distances,  wide  pasture-lands, 
pines,  pure  air,  and  general  freedom  from  disease.  There  no 
dyspepsia,  no  malaria,  no  epidemic  disease  is  possible,  aru.1  all  the 
general  pleasures  and  advantages  to  be  derived  from  climate  are  in 
full  force. 

Of  late  years  ranches  have  been  established  in  many  valleys,  and 
tens  of  thousands  of  cattle  graze  on  the  mountain  slopes.  The 


An  Unprngressive   Granger 


country  is  rich  in  minerals  and  mines,  and  the  general  hopes  always 
attached  to  the  mining  interest  divert  the  minds  of  the  majority  of 
the  foreign  population;  for,  if  it  is  possible  to  be  a  foreigner  in  one's 
own  country,  then  the  American  is  a  foreigner  among  the  Mexicans. 

New  Mexico  is  almost  as  square  in  outline  as  the  rest  of  her 
sisters,  being  on  her  eastern  boundary  345  miles  long,  and  on  her 
western  390  miles,  with  an  average  breadth,  east  and  west,  of  335 
miles. 

The  Territory  contains  121,201  square  miles,  or  77,568,640  acres. 
There  are  only  about  a  dozen  very  large  counties. 


74 


OVERLAND   GUIDE. 


All  of  New  Mexico  is  a  series  of  plateaux,  lying  at  an  average 
elevation  of  about  5,000  feet.  Out  of  these  plateaux  rise  the  mount- 
ain ranges  and  peaks,  sometimes  to  an  elevation  of  more  than  12,000 
feet  above  the  sea. 

Where  the  plateau  in  any  case  is  narrow,  it  of  course  becomes  a 
valley,  often  very  fertile.  ,  The  valley  of  the  Rio  Grande,  (Re-oh 
Gran-day  dail  -Mv-tay,  "  Big  River  of  the  North  ")  is  a  river  valley  in 
all  respects,  with  a  rich  alluvial  soil.  This  is  the  principal  river  of 
the  country,  and  rises  in  Colorado  at  an  elevation  of  nearly  12,000 

feet.  It  runs  through  the 
middle  of  the  Territory 
north  and  south,  and  must 
some  day  become  one  of 
the  most  fruitful  valleys 
in  the  world.  The  diffi- 
culty now  is  that  it  is 
mostly  occupied  by  the 
Mexican  population,  and, 
in  localities,  by  the  Pueblo 
communities.  The  land 
is  held  under  the  Spanish 
grant  system,  and  what 
Americans  and  American 
law  consider  good  titles 
can  not  be  readily  given.  This  is  the  case  with  regard  to  other 
portions  of  the  Territory,  and  constitutes  the  chief  reason  why  the 
growth  of  so  fine  a  mountain  and  valley  country  has  been  retarded. 
Nevertheless,  the  Territory  contains  about  sixty  million  acres  of 
Government  land  not  covered  by  grant  or  adverse  title  of  any  kind. 
Most  of  these  unoccupied  lands  are  available  for  grazing  purposes, 
at  least,  and  a  considerable  proportion  for  agriculture.  The  country 
generally  is  not  nearly  so  hopeless-looking  as  Southern  California 
was  a  dozen  years  ago,  and  the  climate  is  almost  as  good.  The 


El   Hogar   Domestico. 


NEW   MEXICO.  75 

Artesian  well,  and  other  plans  for  obtaining  water,  have  not  been 
tried  with  any  persistency,  and  thousands  of  acres  will  be  redeemed 
and  found  to  be  among  the  most  fruitful  and  valuable  in  the  world 
when  they  are.  Aside  from  this,  there  is  over  most  of  the  Territory 
a  well-defined  rainy  season.  None  of  the  water  falling  there  has  ever 
been  utilized.  The  Mexican  idea  that  the  land  must  be  soaked  by 
ditches  to  raise  anything,  has  been  until  the  last  year  or  two  accepted 
as  a  fact.  It  has  been  found  not  to  be  true  in  other  similar  cases. 
Intelligent  methods  of  cultivation  will  raise  fine  crops  on  much  of 
the  Government  land  now  obtainable.  Congressional  action  in  regard 
to  land  titles,  as  applying  to  lands  not  now  owned  by  the  United 
States,  will  be  a  boon  when  it  comes;  but  one-half  the  energy  and 
skill  and  money  that  have  been  expended  upon  California  would 
produce  results  almost  as  astonishing  here. 

Twenty  years  ago  the  country  was  considered  almost  entirely  water- 
less. The  soldiers  who  chased  the  Apaches  obtained  their  supplies 
long  distances  apart,  and  generally  from  what  were  called  "  tanks;" 
hollow  rocks  where  water  gathered  in  limited  quantities  when  it  rained. 
Where  the  town  of  Deming  now  stands  was  one  of  these  waterless 
regions.  A  few  miles  east  of  there  the  little  Miembres  River  goes 
entirely  out  of  sight  in  the  sand.  Water  was  conceded  to  be  an 
absolute  impossibility,  either  by  digging,  boring  or  witchcraft,  over 
all  that  country. 

Now  the  passer-by  on  that  branch  will  observe  that  Deming  is  full 
of  windmills.  There  is  an  ample  supply  of  water  out  of  shallow  wells. 

There  is  little  or  no  drainage  to  the  country;  at  least  not  suffi- 
cient to  account  for  what  becomes  of  the  water  that  falls,  and  that 
melts  from  snow  in  the  mountains. 

The  plateaux  are  fillings.  The  spaces  between  the  mountains 
and  ranges  that  now  stand  up  out  of  them  were  in  the  beginning 
V-shaped,  and  came  together  at  the  bottom.  They  filled  up  with 
the  wash  from  the  mountains;  the  boulders  and  gravel  falling  first 
-and  lowest;  then  the  soil,  which  is  disintegrated  rock.  The  surface 


76  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

of  this  filling  U  now  the  immense  tracts  OL  level  country  character- 
istic of  the  region. 

The  rainfall  and  melted  snow  goes  every  year  down  the  sides  of 
the  slopes  and  sinks  into  the  soil.  It  will  be  found,  when  bored  for, 
in  the  gravel  where  once  was  the  trough  between  mountains  or 
ranges.  Sometimes  it  may  be  near  the  surface ;  at  other  places  it 
rnay  be  hundreds  of  feet  below. 

Geologists  have  frequently  affirmed  that  this  is  the  first  portion  of 
the  American  continent  that  lifted  itself  above  a  wide  and  sailorless 
sea.  There  are  other  scientists  who  state  that  the  eldest  of  the 
successive  civilizations  existed  here,  and  that  there  was  a  civilized 


What  b«com«  of  the  W  ter. 

people  with  arts  and  a  steadfast  government,  when  our  fore- 
fathers were  savages  under  the  oaks  of  ancient  Britain  or  in  the 
woods  of  Germany.  Be  this  as  it  may,  the  country  is  very  old 
from  even  our  standpoint.  The  native  inhabitants  of  New  Mexico- 
and  Arizona  numbered  many  thousands  when  the  country  was  first 
visited  by  the  Spaniards  in  the  sixteenth  century. 

It  was  first  visited  by  one  Nunez,  a  Spaniard,  who  was  followed 
by  numerous  others  of  his  kind ;  Cabeza  de  Vaca  ("  Cow's  Head," 
an  aristocratic  Spanish  family  name):  Espejo:  Es-/<y-ho  ("  Locking- 
Glass/' also  a  family  name);  Onate;  Coronado  ("  The  Crowned," — 
family  name).  It  is  not  possible,  nor  important,  to  know  all  these 
people.  They  came,  as  usual,  for  gold,  and,  as  usual  not  only  with 
Spaniards  but  with  all  the  rest  of  us,  they  did  not  find  much  of  it 
lying  around  loose. 


NEW    MEXICO. 


7T 


Before  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  century  a  permanent  settlement 
had  been  made.  Santa  Fe  ("  San-tah  Fay  day  San  Hawaii ; — "  the 
Holy  Faith  of  St.  John  ")  was  the  place  selected.  The  town,  or  the 
immediate  vicinity,  had  been  a  kind  of  political  and  religious  capital 
for  an  indefinite  time  before  the  Spaniards  came.  These  wonder- 
ful explorers  began  at  Santa  Fe,  and  at  San  Augustine,  Florida,, 
about  the  same  time ; — so  nearly  together  at  the  end  of  the  fifteenth 
century  that  very  few  people  know  precisely  which  of  the  two  towns, 
is  the  oldest.  But  Santa  F6  was  the  capital  of  an  organized  com- 
munity and  of  a  form  of  civilization  so  long  before  that  date  that 
there  can  be  little  doubt  that  it  is  not  only  the  most  ancient 
city  still  existing  in  this 
country,  but  that  it  is 
aho  one  of  the  most 
ancient  capitals  of  the 
world.  It  still  remains 
largely  what  it  always 
was.  It  does  not  de- 
cay; on  the  contrary,  it 
is  almost  spoiled  by 
modern  brick  houses. 
It  was  a  much  more 
interesting  place  twenty  years  ago  than  it  is  now.  But  now, — to 
traverse  the  seventeen  miles  from  the  station  of  Lamy  to  Santa  F£ 
is  one  of  the  pleasantest  mountain  railroad  rides  in  the  country,  and 
there  is  still  interest  and  oddity  enough  to  occupy  the  few  hours  one 
will  stay  there. 

But  the  actual,  original  explorers  of  New  Mexico; — the  people  who 
came  to  stay; — were  the  Franciscan  priests.  The  difficulties  they 
encountered  were  appalling.  There  is  a  very  grave  doubt  if  the 
original  Mexican — whom  we  now  call  the  Pueblo — has  ever  been 
converted.  If  so,  it  is  not  a  thorough  regeneration,  but  a  mixture  of 
every  Christian  belief  with  his  ancient  religion.  This  Pueblo  lived 


New  Mexico  Oven. 


Pueblo  Citizen  (from  a  Photograph). 

(78) 


NEW   MEXICO.  79 

under  just  laws,  justly  administered.  He  had  a  system  of  worship 
and  a  defined  belief.  He  was,  like  the  modern  Chinaman,  very 
hard  to  convince.  Often,  like  the  Chinaman,  he  complied  with  the 
forms,  but  maintained  his  private  belief.  He  clung  to  the  religion  of 
his  fathers,  and  hated  that  of  the  conquerors,  and  kept  killing 
Franciscans  from  time  to  time. 

After  he  had  been  preached  to  and  enslaved  for  almost  a  century; 
— for  the  two  things  went  together; — he  in  1680  rose  in  rebellion. 
All  Spaniards  suffered  together.  All  the  foreigners  who  were  not 
killed  fled  toward  Paso  del  Norte. 

[This  is  where  the  city  of  EL  PASO,  Texas,  now  stands.  Pafi-so  dail 
Nor-tay  is  a  rock-bottom  ford  on  the  Rio  Grande,  and  the  name 
means  "  Pass  of  the  North."  It  is  the  ancient  gateway  of  Mexican 
trade,  used  when  New  Mexico  was  an  AzteC  dependency,  as  it  after- 
ward was  a  Spanish  and  Mexican  one.  An  ox-team  and  cart  can  be 
driven  without  difficulty  from  Santa  F6  to  the  City  of  Mexico; — 
nearly  two  thousand  miles  through  a  country  all  mountains.] 

The  Spaniards  did  not  regain  a  foothold  for  several  years,  and 
after  many  unsuccessful  attempts.  And  then  they  could  not  retain 
it  with  any  comfort  until  they  did  what  no  Spaniard  has  ever  been 
known  to  do  before  or  since ;  they  retracted.  They  abandoned  the 
mines,  and  recalled  the  infamous  edict  by  which  the  natives  had 
been  unlawfully  enslaved. 

This  little  bit  of  history  has,  strangely  enough,  never  excited 
remark.  The  Spaniards  have  never  been  in  the  habit  of  doing  such 
things,  and  have  lost  nearly  all  their  immense  possessions  on  this 
side  of  the  sea  by  not  doing  it.  The  poor  Pueblo,  always  respected 
by  those  who  know  him,  but  still  a  miserable  "  Indian,"  wears  this 
one  historic  feather  in  his  dilapidated  hat ;  he  made  the  Spaniard 
come  down. 

Neither  is  it  generally  known,  or  thought  of  if  known,  that  the 
"  Santo  oficio,  "  the  "  Holy  Inquisition,"  held  its  horrible  functions 
at  one  time  here.  This  was  before  the  1680  rebellion.  With 

6 


BQ 


OVKKLAM)  (iL'IDK. 


slavery,  a  changed  religion,  and  the  tortures  and  punishments  of  the 
Inquisition  to  enforce  it,  the  Indian  cup  must  have  been  as  nearly 
full  as  it  has  ever  been  since,  even  under  our  administration  of 
Indian  affairs. 


Pueblo  Mothf 


a  Photograph). 


It  is  also  not  usually  thought  of  that  of  the  full  blood  of  the 
Pueblos,  of  some  of  whose  villages  you  will  catch  glimpses  from  the 
car-windows,  was  the  ablest  and  best  of  all  the  presidents  of  Mexico, 


NEW   MEXICO.  81 

Benito  Juarez.  The  present  president,  Diaz,  possesses  only  a  little 
less  of  the  Indian  blood. 

It  is  also  an  historical  fact  worth  remembering  that  of  the  twelve 
million  inhabitants  of  Mexico  about  ten  million  are  Mexicans;  that  is, 
Aztecs;  Pueblos.  Now,  these  people  have  had  the  life,  the  courage, 
the  national  tenacity,  to  survive  a  Spanish  occupancy  that  lasted 
from  the  invasion  of  Cortez  to  1821,  and  then  achieve  absolute  free- 
dom, modernized  into  a  republican  form  of  government.  Since  1821 
they  have  repelled,  under  the  leadership  of  the  Pueblo,  Juarez,  the 
tripartite  effort  of  the  European  powers  to  establish  an  empire  on 
their  soil ;  a  story  that  everybody  is  familiar  with,  but  which  few 
think  of  in  this  connection.  Perhaps  the  virility  of  the  Pueblo  may 
yet  show  itself  in  the  making  of  a  great  country  out  of  Mexico. 
Stranger  things  have  happened. 

That  New  Mexico  should  be  strewn  with  ruins  is  to  be  expected. 
They  lie  in  nooks  and  corners  everywhere.  But  they  tell  little. 
The  documents  by  which  their  history  might  be  ascertained  were 
largely  destroyed  at  the  time  of  the  rebellion.  The  general  conclu- 
sion by  every  visitor  is  that  it  is,  historically,  a  very  old  country, 
and  ck-tails  are  not  sought.  Perhaps  they  are  unimportant.  The 
old  days  and  the  old  life  are  largely  swallowed  up  in  ttye  new.  To 
the  average  American  antiquity  is  a  bore,  and  the  present  dollar  is 
the  only  item  of  importance. 

Our  interest  in  N-ew  Mexico  begins  in  1846,  with  the  occupation 
of  the  capital  by  General  Kearney.  This  was  followed  by  the  con- 
clusion of  the  Mexican  War  and  the  treaty  of  Guadaloupe  Hidalgo. 
We  should  unquestionably  have  held  it  just  the  same,  but  the 
treaty  placed  the  matter  beyond  dispute. 

[Guadaloupe  Hidalgo  is  a  village  about  seven  miles  out  of 
the  City  of  Mexico.  There  is  a  rambling  adobe  country-house 
there,  in  which  the  commissioners  resided  and  the  celebrated 
treaty  was  signed.  The  village,  and  not  the  City  of  Mexico, 
probably  became  unwittingly  famous  as  the  scene  of  a  very  shrewd 


82  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

transaction  in  real  estate  through  some  freak  of  diplomatic 
etiquette.] 

But  previous  to  this  military  occupation  we  had  some  doings  quiie 
after  the  Spanish  fashion.  Our  Captain  Pike  ventured  into  the 
country  by  mistake  in  1805-6.  He  excited  the  suspicion  of  the 
Spaniards,  who  courteously  arrested  him,  and  seem  to  have  marched 
him  pretty  much  all  over  New  and  Old  Mexico.  He  did  not  get 
back  again  until  1807. 

[Zebulon  Montgomery  Pike  seems  to  have  entirely  deserved  the 
magnificent  natural  monument  referred  to  on  a  preceding  page. 
He  was  born  a  soldier,  served  his  apprenticeship  in  arms  in  his 
father's  regiment,  was  the  most  intelligent  and  undaunted  explorer 
of  his  times,  and  was  finally  killed  in  battle  under  his  country's  flag. 
A  careful  reading  of  his  life  and  explorations  would  not  come  amiss 
to  the  average  youth  of  these  times.] 

New  Mexico  is  the  land  of  resorts.  The  mountain  scenery,  pure 
air,  brilliant  sunshine,  and  dry  climate  make  it  so.  There  are  innumer- 
able nooks  and  corners,  in  addition  to  the  advertised  resorts,  where 
one  would  like  to  spend  a  summer  on  his  own  account.  Las  Vegas 
Hot  Springs,  a  resort  near  the  town  of  Las  Vegas,  is  one  of  the 
most  attractive.  The  Manitou  resorts,  near  Colorado  Springs,  and 
reached  by  a  branch  of  the  line  from  La  Junta,  are  also  very  popular. 
There  are  others  coming  forward  not  as  yet  so  well  known;  Jemez 
Springs,  and  Cascade,  Santa  F6,  and  others. 

For  the  mere  purpose  of  crossing  the  country,  its  beauty  is  not 
lost.  It  is  a  pleasant  land,  full  of  charming  glimpses  of  sky  and 
mountain,  and  dotted  with  sufficient  population  of  all  kinds  to 
keep  it  from  seeming  lonesome.  It  does  not  much  matter  to  us, 
perhaps,  what  its  resources  may  be.  The  landscape  is  ours. 

RATON  is  the  first  town  beyond  the  Pass.  It  is  important  in 
being  a  dining  station  in  a  region  where  a  good  appetite  is  the  de- 
cided rule. 

Part    of   the    importance   of   Raton   does   not,  however,  appear 


NEW   MEXICO.  83 

upon  the  surface,  as  it  is  the  centre  of  a  considerable  cattle 
industry. 

Just  below  the  town  is  a  spur  running  to  Blossburg; — another 
coal  mine.  There  may  be  a  capitalist  along,  and  he  may  be  inter- 
ested to  know  that  in  the  matter  of  coal  New  Mexico  is  a  second 
Pennsylvania.  One-fourth  of  the  whole  area  of  121,000  square 
miles  is  underlaid  with  coal  of  the  best  quality.  The  measures  of 
which  the  outcrop  was  seen  near  Trinidad,  extend  unbroken  for  two 
hundred  and  fifty  miles.  The  only  anthracite  coal-beds  found  in 
accessible  and  paying  quantity  west  of  the  Alleghanies  are  in  Santa 
Fe  County. 

The  cattle-business,  of  which  the  town  of  Raton  has  been  alluded 
to  as  a  centre,  has  attracted  thither  so  distinguished  an  individual  as 
Ex-Senator  Dorsey,  and  with  him  is  reputed  to  be  interested  Col. 
Robert  Ingersoll,  of  the  silvery  tongue.  Just  below  the  town,  where 
an  endless  wire  fence  extends  on  each  side  of  the  road,  is  the  Dorsey 
ranch. 

In  sight,  and  not  seeming  to  be  sixty-five  miles  away,  is  the 
queerly-shaped  mountain  known  as  WAGON  MOUND,  referred  to  on 
a  previous  page. 

At  Watrous,  a  little  station  that  owes  its  greatest  importance  to 
some  pretty  scenery,  the  train  enters  the  wide,  green  plateau  named 
by  the  Spaniards  LAS  VEGAS; — "The  Meadows."  This  is  one  of 
the  most  extensive  and  beautiful  of  the  New  Mexican  plateaux.  So 
wide  is  it,  and  fenced  by  mountains  on  all  sides,  that  it  is  difficult  to 
think  of  it  as  having  a  general  elevation  of  more  than  six  thousand 
feet;  as  being  an  extensive  mountain-top  in  fact. 

The  plain  extends  from  here  down  to  the  Glorieta  Mountains, 
some  sixty-five  miles,  with  a  width  proportionate. 

LAS  VEGAS  is  a  town  which  takes  its  name  from  its  location,  and 
is  where  the  traveler  is  expected  again  to  indulge  his  appetite.  It  also 
has  an  old  town  and  a  new;  the  old  one  being  out  of  sight,  with  the 
usual  retiring  disposition  of  all  New  Mexican  towns  after  the  rail- 


(84) 


NEW   MEXICO.  85 

road  comes.  The  place  is  of  considerable  commercial  importance, 
with  a  population  of  several  thousand. 

There  is  a  branch  at  Las  Vegas,  of  course,  but  this  time  it  is  not 
to  a  coal  mine.  Six  miles  away,  and  reached  by  this  branch,  is  the 
watering-place  and  health-resort  known  as  LAS  VEGAS  HOT  SPRINGS. 
It  is  a  mountain  nook  where  there  are  a  large  number  of  hot  and 
cold  springs,  a  beautiful  hotel,  extensive  bath-houses,  and  all  the 
appliances  necessary  to  tired  people  and  invalids.  The  surround- 
ings of  this  spot  are  very  attractive,  and  the  waters  have  a  wide  rep- 
utation for  medicinal  virtue. 

[  I  ,uhs-  Ftfy-gahs  is  the  correct  pronunciation  of  this  name,  con- 
trary to  the  usual  custom  of  saying  "  Loss  Vaygus."] 

It  is  unfortunate  to  leave  Las  Vegas  after  supper  on  a  moonless 
night,  because  the  Glorieta  Mountains  are  not  far  ahead,  and  they 
are  worth  looking  at.  But  time-tables  continually  change,  and  the 
reader  may  dine  at  Las  Vegas  and  sup  somewhere  else  ; — an  arrange- 
ment much  the  pleasantest.  There  may  be  a  moon  ;  and  when  there 
is  it  is  usually  very  bright. 

The  scenery  of  the  Glorieta  Pass  is  by  no  means  sublime.  Yet  it 
scarcely  comes  under  the  head  of  "  pretty,"  which  the  young  lady  of 
the  party  is  sure  to  apply  to  it.  We  have  now  traveled  several  hun- 
dred miles  without  having  traversed  a  forest  of  any  kind  except 
when  we  entered  the  mountains  just  beyond  Trinidad  this  morning. 
Here  are  the  children  of  the  mountains  stretching  away  in  thick 
undulations  as  far  as  one  can  see.  The  train  threads  a  rocky  canyon, 
puffing  and  twisting  up  a  winding  grade  only  a  little  less  steep  than 
that  at  Raton  Pass.  Away  to  the  north  the  mountains  lie  piled,  in 
Summer  green  ;  Li  Winter  green-and-white.  The  air  is  cool,  even 
in  midsummer,  and  at  intervals  there  is  a  rushing  stream.  The 
whole  pass,  some  thirty  miles  long,  is  a  scene  of  beauty  so  immedi- 
ately at  hand  that  one  has  a  desire  to  get  out  and  walk  through  it. 
Some  of  it  is  like  ,'i  natural  park  which  no  artificial  effort  could  equal. 
Some  of  it  is  made  of  alternate  rocks  and  deep  gorges.  Some  of  it 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


is  cliffs,  and  it  is  all  pines.  The  summit  is  the  little  town  called 
Glorieta  ;  a  place  where  there  is  nothing  but  two  houses,  a  saloon, 
and  scenery  ;  and  from  there  there  is  another  case  of  air-brakes  and 
holding  back.  Half  way  down  is  visible  through  the  trees,  and  in 
the  Valley  of  the  Pecos,  the  venerable  and  massive  ruin  of  what  is 
called  Old  Pecos  Church.  When  found  by  modern  adventurers  it 
had  been  roofless  so  long  that  there  was  no  tradition  of  when  it  was 
not  so,  but  the  adobe  walls,  six  or  eight  feet  thick,  were  still  stand- 
ing, and  in  a  surprisingly  good  state  of  preserva- 
tion. A  few  years  ago  the  interior  was  strewn 
with  cedar  beams,  quaintly  carved, 
but  these  have  long  since  been  car- 
ried away. 

Notwithstanding  any  hints 
at  history  that  may  be  noted 
on  previous  pages,  places 
like  Pecos  Church  go  far  to 
convince  one  that  this  coun- 
try really  has  no  history. 
You  must  guess  aU  the  de- 
tails of  the  past.  There  is 
evidence  that  the  Pueblos 
were  here  a  thousand  years^ 
perhaps,  before  the  Spaniards- came.  The  dimly-defined  ruins  of  an 
extensive  town  lie  around  the  church.  When  Cabeza  de  Vaca 
crossed  the  country  in  1536,  not  knowing  where  he  was,  he  found 
this  place.  It  was  called  "  A-gu-yu,"  and  the  church  was  after- 
wards built  to  convert  the  A-gu-yu-ans.  About  1540  is  the  nearest 
guess  that  can  be  made  as  to  the  date  of  its  erection.  These  old 
walls  have  been  nearly  350  years  in  crumbling,  and,  merely  dried 
mud  in  the  first  place,  they  still  remain. 

The  ruins  around  it  are  perhaps  more  interesting  than  the  church 
is,  since  they  have  the  effect  of  giving  a  mere  undecipherable  hint 


NEW   MEXICO. 


87 


of  a  departed  people,  of  whom  less  is  actually  known  than  of  the  old- 
est of  the  Egyptians.  All  the  valleys  are  strewn  with  such  remains, 
more  or  less  distinct,  and  all  indications  point  to  the  fact  that  these 
and  the  scattered  communities  of  the  Pueblos  of  to-day  are  of  the 
same  people. 

Coming  to  names  again,  as  is  frequently  necessary  in  this  country, 
one  wonders  why  a  stream  should  have  been  named  Pecos,  (Pay- 
cose)  which  means  simply  "freckles"; — not  spots  or  spotted,  like  a 
cow,  but  plain,  ordinary  freckles.  It  is  of  no  importance,  but  some 


Primitive  Industry 


of  these  names  are  subjects  for  a  good  deal  of  harmless  guessing. 
As  they  decline  to  say  "  kuevas"  ("wavas)  for  eggs,  in  Mexico,  and 
call  them  always  "  blanquillos,"  (blan-&^/-yose)  literally  "  little 
white  things,"  so  may  they  have  called  this  mountain  stream,  for 
instance,  just  "freckles,"  as  an  allusion  sufficiently  distinct  to  the 
speckled  sides  of  the  mountain  trout. 

The  western  end  of  Glorieta  Pass  is  called  Apache  canyon. 
There  are  many  Apache  canyons  .scattered  through  the  Rocky 
mountain  region.  This  is  one  of  them.  This  red  devil  was,  in  his 


ss  0\  l-'Kl  AM>  GUIDE 

prime,  very  nearly  ubiquitous,  aiul  was  a  famous  lurker  in  the  narrow 
•as  where  liis  prey  would  be  ob  .  ami  there  he  made 

.Jit  of  it.  aiul  got  him-  ;  had 

ted  in  the  open   field. 

Hut  thr  . \parlio  did  not  have  a   monopoly  of  this  beautiful  nook 
of  the  mountain  world   for   lighting  pu:  I  -harp  little 

battle  oeetirreil  here  in  1847.  bct\\ccn  a   body  of   I'.eneral    K 
troops  anil  tin  : her  occurred  between  the   Federals 

and  the  Confedera:  in  iS6.\      IVtails  of  these  little  battles, 

or  of  the  Indian  skirmishes  or  massacres  from  which  the  place  takes 
its  n  ime,  are  now  hardly  to  be  obtained. 

Just   beside  the  western  end   of  this   ,  the  track, 

stands   a    little    tenantlcss    adobe    buildins;.      There    is    apparently 
no    n  '.tachinv:    to    it.      Hut    it    was  the    school-house 

The 

Indians  are  gone,  only   this  little  build'..  dence 

of  practical   n  Ancient  ruin  r 

1   \M\    is  the  ItatKH)   from  which  the  branch  runs 

Santa  \-\'\  seventeen  miles.      It  d  during  the  m-ht   by   one 

tram,    but    during    the    afternoon    !  :.      Persons  desr. 

visit  Santa  l-Y>  can  arrange  I  .y.  if  upon  the  \\  in,  by 

stopping  a  few  ho..  9    \  i  |M, 

taking  the  proper  train   from    t  d  reiurr. 

I.amy  and  continuing  the  j 

Gloneta  Pass  is  the  real  \\  !  of  this  region,  and    the   - 

from  the  summit  down  the  western  the  entrance  to  t:. 

I'irande  Valley.      I  p  tC  '  t  all  the  Streams  How  southward  and 

.iril.  tlowinginto  theiiiilf  some  hundred-  -  further  to  the 

northward  than  th,  :ween  the  Texan  and  Mexi- 

can I  Hrownsviile  and  W 

The  name    ('.lor.,  not  (/Yi>r/V7/«i)  is  a   Spanish 

that   may  be  I  d  ti>  mean  a  pleasant  place.     A  bo\\ 


'.     MI  \ICO.  89- 

llollse    III    .1    ;',  II  den,    .I    st  ni<  I  II  I  e    lil.lde    <  it    open   \vnnd    \V<  'I  I.    .11  id    '  ' 

willi  vines,  is  called  a  "  gfol 

There  ll  a   hUge  Hal   L.j.prd  mount. nn  risible  ""  l>"lli  sides   ill    the 
j).iss,  and  nllen  .1  prominent    <»l»|e<  I   .it   the  dr. I. mi  e  n|     hli\    t.,  ei;dily 

miles.* that  the  tourist  often  wishes  to  i>n<>\\  ahout.    'i  ins  is  "Star* 


Starvation  P«ak. 

There   is,   of   course,   a  story  connected    \\ith    it, 
from  \\liifh  its  name  is  derived.     In  fact,  there  are  several  stories. 

So   much    do    tin-  i.  vary   that    you    can't    tell,  after   ln-arin;'. 

1    of    them,  \vlicl  her    it.    was    Indians    or    Mf.xi'ans   who 
driven  ihrrr.  and  eventually  starved  lo  drail,  hy  sie^c.      'I  he  starving 
and    tin:    h<-sie;MM^    if    laid    .ilternately    upon    eii|,<i     party.       I  ,et    HI 


-90  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

content  ourselves  with  the  hope  that  the  sufferers  were  Apaches, 
and  that  none  of  them  ever  got  down  again. 

There  are  always,  for  some  reason,  three  gigantic  crosses  on  the 
summit,  except  when,  as  sometimes  happens,  one  or  more  of  them  has 
been  blown  down.  They  seem  to  be  maintained  there  by  the  cus- 
tom of  the  country,  and  in  commemoration  of  the  event  from  which 
the  mountain  derives  its  not  very  attractive  name. 

A  few  miles  beyond  Lamy  you  enter  the  actual  valley,  and  the 
scene  again  very  decidedly  changes.  It  is  about  as  foreign  as.Persia 
or  Xubia,  and,  indeed,  not  very  unlike  the  latter  in  appearance, 
have  now  reached,  if  you  ever  will,  the  land  "  where  it  is  always  after- 
noon." Beside  the  track  is  the  stubborn  old  life  of  the  Spanish 
peasant,  as  poor,  as  happy,  and  as  quaint  as  it  ever  was  at  home.  It 
is  a  land  of  ancient  and  changeless  custom.  The  Mexican  village 
is  there,  drowsy  in  the  sunshine,  with  all  its  "  improvements  "  made 
and  all  its  hopes  realized,  as  ignorant  of  the  meaning  of  the  w<  rd 
"  boom  "  as  Babylon  is.  There  is  something  oriental  about  every 
Mexican  house.  It  is  either  built  around  a  square,  or  is  a  modifi- 
•cation  of  that  plan.  In  this  square  should  be  stored  all  the  family 
property,  and  the  goats,  fowls,  don  1  pigs  should  be  there 

also  at  night.  This  house  is  always  of  adobe,  and  almost  always 
clean.  Its  floor  is  of  hard-packed  earth,  and  its  roof  as  well.  It  is 
not  necessarily  the  dwelling  of  abject  poverty  ;  not  a  hovel.  Indeed, 
that  is  seldom  the  case.  It  is  simply  the  house  of  the  country,  and 
neither  the  proper  soil  to  make  the  bricks  of,  nor  the  climate  which 
will  permit  of  their  durability,  exists  elsewhere. 

The  village  composed  of  these  houses  is  a  curious  place  when 
seen  for  the  first  time  by  American  eyes.  But  you  can  never  arrive 
at  the  true  inwardness  of  it  without  living  in  one  for  a  while,  and 
having  some  knowledge  of  Spanish.  Seen  at  a  distance  of  two  or 
three  miles,  it  looks  like  an  unburned  brick-kiln.  Close  at  hand,  it 
is  the  only  place  in  this  wide  country  where  there  is  no  newspaper, 
no  advertising,  no  schemes,  no  boom,  no  prospective  rise  in  the 


Picnic  Party  at  Las  Vegas  Hot  Springs. 


(91) 


OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

price  of  lots,  no  worry.  Life  goes  on  undisturbed  by  any  of  the 
changes.  There  are  births  and  weddings  and  deaths  ;  that  is  all. 
Away  from  the  railroad,  the  village  street  is  a  path  originally  made  by 
that  accomplished  pathfinder,  the  Mexican  donkey.  It  is  a  mountain 
nook,  or  a  little  valley,  or  a  place  beside  a  spring.  There  are  no 
lawyers  or  doctors  there,  or  any  politics.  They  are  rural  swains, 
and  the  only  scholar  is  the  priest,  and  he  often  does  not  know  too 
much.  They  are  a  people  thoroughly  accomplished  in  their  own  way 
of  life.  They  have  no  theories.  There  are  no  experiments  to  try. 
Their  continued  existence  and  prosperity  is  certain.  The  lads  and 
lasses  grow  up  and  marry  and  die.  They  often  live  to  a  very  old 
age.  Surrounded  by  mountains,  under  a  lovely  sky,  industrious  in 
their  way,  and  frugal,  the  people  of  the  a\  Mexican  village 

have  a  recipe  for  happiness  the  possession  of  which  the  anxious 
American  does  not  envy  them.  But  it  would  do  him  good,  never- 
theless. 

But  they  are  not  barbarians.  There  is  an  easy  courtesy,  a  perfect 
understanding  of  even  the  statelier  forms  of  politeness,  that  is  aston- 
ishing. It  is  an  inheritance,  for  this  man  is,  after  all,  and  after  the 
lapse  of  more  than  three  long  centuries  of  isolation,  a  Spanish  peasant. 
He  is,  in  manners,  language  and  religion,  what  he  was  in  1598.  The 
Spaniard  is  the  true  Bourbon  of  the  world,  and  the  Bourbons  u'cre 
Spaniards.  He  never  changes.  This  man  in  only  isolated  cases  is 
mixed  with  the  Pueblo.  The  usual  idea  is  that  the  peasant  of  New 
Mexico,  and  the  same  class  in  Old  Mexico,  are  alike.  They  are 
very  different.  In  the  first  case  he  is,  almost  without  mixture,  a 
Spaniard  ;  in  the  last  he  is,  equally  without  mixture,  a  Pueblo,  an 
Aztec,  a  Toltec,  an  Indian  ; — whatever  you  choose  to  call  the 
original  people  of  the  country.  There  are  reasons  why  this  should 
be  so,  too  long  and  speculative  for  discussion  in  a  book  of  travel. 

And  here  you  come  upon  a  string  of  names  that  at  once  indicate 
the  foreigrmess  of  the  region.  Here  is  BERNAL,  and  later  on  BER- 
NALILLO.  Ber-«a/,  a  common  boy's  name.  He  was  originally  a 


jgas  Hot  Springs. 


(93) 


94  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

Saint ;  Bern-ah-/^/y0,  is  simply  "  little  Bernal."  San  Miguel  (Satin- 
Me-^0/7)  is  St.  Michael.  Lamy  (La/i-my)  is  French  ;  the  name  of 
the  Archbishop  of  Santa  F6,  Ortiz,  (Or-/<r^),  a  family  name.  Los 
Cerrillos,  (Lose  Cer-^/-yose),  little  hills  ; — Cerro,  a  hill;  illo,  ito,  ico, 
&c.,  being  Spanish  diminutives,  used  wherever  possible.  Albu- 
querque;— originally  Al&rquerque  (^/-boo-ker-kee),  a  family  name, 
and  somewhat  historical  as  having  been  borne  by  a  Spanish  general. 
Isleta;  should  be  Ysleta;  (Ees-Ay-tah),  a  little  island.  Rosario, 
Ro-Jfl^-re-oh)  a  rosary.  Elota  (E-/c?-tah)  a  girl's  name.  Algodones, 
(Al-go-<&-nais)  cotton  ;  cotton-lands.  Alameda,  (Ah-lah-w0y-dah)  a 
shaded  walk;  a  road  lined  with  shade  trees. 

Of  such  names  the  country  is  full.  They  occur  at  frequent  inter- 
vals between  here  and  California.  They  are  nearly  always  mispro- 
nounced, and  still  more  frequently  their  meaning  is  misunderstood. 
Very  often  some  trivial  circumstance,  long  since  forgotten,  and, 
indeed,  never  worthy  of  remembrance,  gave  rise  to  them.  They 
often  smack  of  saints  and  sacredness.  In  Spain  it  is  not  uncom- 
mon to  name  a  steamboat  or  a  factory  after  the  Holy  Ghost,  and 
here,  as  there,  children  are  often  named  Jesus.  These  people  will 
also  often  turn  the  picture  of  the  Virgin  to  the  wall  if  they  intend  to 
do  anything  particularly  bad.  It  is  all  of  a  piece;  they  are  not 
really  very  pious,  except  as  a  matter  of  names  and  form. 

Isleta,  named  above,  is  just  south  of  the  junction  where  through 
cars  leave  the  main  line  of  road  which  goes  southward  to  El  Paso, 
and  are  carried  westward  over  the  Atlantic  and  Pacific,  (part  of  the 
system)  and  across  Arizona  and  the  greater  part  of  California,  to  the 
Pacific  coast.  But  Isleta  is  also  a  Pueblo  capital,  being  the  largest 
and  most  industrial  of  the  towns  now  remaining.  It  presents  a  very 
pleasant  picture  of  contented,  though  communal,  industry.  Nobody 
is  poor,  everybody  is  contented;  but  one  who  knew  the  place  some 
years  ago  can  not  help  wondering  that  it  should  retain  so  much  of  its 
old  character  after  the  railroad  came;  a  coming  full  as  strange  to  these 
Indians  as  that  of  the  expected  Montezuma  could  be.  There  is 


NEW    MEXICO. 


95 


something  peculiar  about  the  ways  and  habits  of  thought  of  these 
old  races.  They  seem  to  possess  in  a  degree  not  even  conceivable 
by  the  Saxon,  a  faculty  for  minding  their  own  affairs.  They  do  not 
know;  they  do  not  wish  to  know.  They  do  not  change,  and  are  not 
even  affected  by  the  daily  presence  of  that  most  far-reaching  and  bene- 
ficent of  the  triumphs  of  human  genius,  a  railroad.  You  may  people 
the  desert,  you  may  build  cities,  you  may  increase  the  values  of  a 
whole  region  a  hundred  per  cent,  in  a  single  year,  you  may  make 
boundless  wealth  in  places  where  in  all  the  ages  before  there  was 
nothing  but  wind  and  silence,  but  by  the  same  means  there  are  at 
least  four  races  you  can  not 
affect  in  the  least;  Spaniards, 
Chinese,  Indians,  and  Pueblos. 
They  all  accept  it  as  an  unin- 
vestigated  fact.  They  do  not 
often  look  at  it,  and  very  seldom 
ride  on  it.  They  do  not  even 
resent  it.  The  old  Pueblo  who 
plods  beside  the  track  with  his 
string  of  laden  donkeys  does 
not  even  turn  his  head.  He 
who  prunes  his  vines  or  digs 
amongst  his  onions  or  chile,  does  not  look  up.  The  railroad  amid 
these  vineyards  is  a  staring  and  startling  incongruity,  and  there  is 
a  sense  in  which  it  has  spoiled  New  Mexico. 

ALBUQUERQUE,  where  in  the  watches  of  the  night  vpu  will  feel 
yourself  being  pushed  about  and  coupled  and  uncoupled,  is  the 
metropolis  of  the  upper  Rio  Grande  valley.  The  old  town  is,  of 
course,  behind  and  quite  out  of  sight;  the  new  and  the  old  together 
have  a  population  of  some  twelve  thousand.  The  electric  light 
flashes  there  now,  and  all  the  life  you  see  is  of  the  very  newest 
American  cast.  But,  if  you  could  build  the  civilization  of  1888  as  an 
.annex  to  Jerusalem,  and  still  leave  the  old  city  of  the  priests  and 


Sitting  in  the  Sun. 


NEW    MEXICO.  97 

prophets  as  it  is,  and  could  walk  from  one  place  into  the  other  when 
you  wished,  you  would  have  nothing  more  strange  than  you  can  see 
now  if  you  wander  about  Albuquerque  in  daylight  and  at  leisure. 

The  breakfast  station,  going  west,  is  COOLIDGE,  one  thousand  and 
thirty-eight  miles  from  the  Missouri.  It  is  the  second  morning  out, 
and  we  are  still  in  New  Mexico,  though  only  thirty-eight  miles  from 
the  eastern  border  of  Arizona. 

Since  leaving  the  Rio  Grande,  which  we  do  when  we  turn  west- 
ward at  Albuquerque,  it  has  been  plains-country,  with  mountains  in 
the  distance  on  every  side.  The  scene  is  very  different  in  details 
from  what  we  had  yesterday.  Though  still  mountains,  the  sensations 
are  not  the  same.  About  this  there  is  a  peculiar  vastness  that  makes 
one  feel  like  a  being  infinitely  small  ;  a  speck  in  immensity. 

There  is  a  glimpse  that  will  interest  you  if  you  should  pass  the 
place  in  the  day  time,  (which  you  do  at  least  on  the  return  trip).  It 
is  LA<;I:NA,  sixty-six  miles  west  of  Albuquerque,  a  Pueblo  town 
built  after  the  most  ancient  fashion,  and  in  that  respect  unlike  Isleta. 
It  is  perched  upon  a  sterile  hill  close  beside  the  track,  and  is  a  com- 
pact cluster,  in  effect  all  one  house,  capable  of  holding  eight  him. 
dred  or  one  thousand  people.  It  was  at  one  time  without  any  doors, 
the  people  climbing  ladders  to  the  roofs,  and  then  taking  the  ladder 
up  after  them,  descending  again  to  the  interior  through  a  hole  in  the 
roof.  In  later  times,  however,  a  few  openings  have  been  made 
below. 

This  curious  town  is  terraced  so  that  half  the  occupations  of  life 
may  be  carried  on  on  the  roof.  It  is  a  kind  of  human  ant  hill.  It 
would,  however,  be  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  this  Pueblo  idea  of 
architecture  was  a  fashion  merely.  Living  time  immemorial  sur- 
rounded by  enemies  ;  Apaches,  Navajoes,  etc.,  all  of  them  nomads 
and  robbers  by  nature,  the  terraced  house  was  a  necessity.  The 
Pueblos  are  farmers  as  totally  unlike  the  North  American  Indian  as 
possible.  He  can  fight,  and  does  upon  occasion,  or  he  would  long 
since  have  become  extinct.  But  he  always  had  something  eatable 


98 


OVERLAND   GUIDE. 


valuable  to  be  robbed  of,  and  he  could  not 
his  tent  and  steal  away.     The  fight  he  has 
made  for  hundreds  of  years, 
purely     in     self-defense,    has 
been  a  most  galiant  one. 

As  you  pass  Lacuna  (Lah- 
gM-nah  ;  a  lake)  there  may 
not  be  a  soul  in  sight.  But 
there  are  occasionally  some 
little  black-eyed,  cotton-clad 
urchins  on  the  rocks.  These 


A  Great-gr«at-granddaught»r  of  Castil*. 

people  work  some  arable  and 
watered  land  not  far  away, 
and  the  children  are  usually 
out  in  the  plain,  herding 
sheep. 

The  Pueblo  of  Acoma 
(/^-o-mab)  is  about  twelve 
miles  from  McCarty's  sta- 
tion, twenty-seven  miles  west 
of  Laguna.  This  curious 
place  is  a  "  City  in  the  Sky." 
There  is  a  wide  canyon  with 
precipitous  sides  only  to  be 
descended  by  zig-zag  paths. 
Where  this  canyon  widens 
out  into  a  vallev  there  is  a 


A   New  Mexican   Matron. 


NEW    MEXICO. 


99 


mass  of  rock  standing  isolated,  high  and  steep.  There  was  until  the 
last  few  years  only  one  way  of  reaching  the  top  of  this  ;  a  perpen- 
dicular path  with  notches  in  it  that  would  fit  the  toe  of  a  moccason, 
and  were  worn  to  that  exact  shape.  Up  and  down  this  path  these 
Pueblos  went  daily  for  nobody  knows  how  many  years,  and  they  do 
it  yet.  But  they  have  now  made  a  road  on  the  opposite  side,  very 


A  Pueblo,  New  Mexico. 

steep  and  difficult,  up  which  animals  that  are  accustomed  to  it  can 
go,  one  at  a  time.  The  city  at  the  top  is  about  three  acres  in  extent. 
Down  in  the  plain  there  are  patches  of  cultivated  ground,  the  farms 
of  these  sky-dwellers. 

Some  distance  up  the  valley  beyond  Acoma  there  is  another  high 
and  inaccessible  rock  called  LA  MESA  ENCANTADA  (Maysah  Encan- 
to/j-dah)  "  The  Haunted  Hill."  The  true  story  of  this  place  is  a 


100  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

touching  one,  and  there  is  a  reason  for  the  peculiar  name.  It  was 
once  the  home  of  the  people  of  Acoma,  used  as  Acoma  is  now. 
One  day  the  whole  population  of  the  town,  men,  women  and 
children,  with  the  exception  of  three  ailing  women,  were  in  the 
valley  below  at  work.  It  was  harvest  time,  and  they  all  worked 
together  according  to  custom  on  such  occasions. 

A  cloud-burst,  as  the  sudden  Hoods  of  this  country  are  called, 
occurred  up  the  valley.  A  great  wave  came  down  the  valley  and 
undermined  the  sand  upon  which  rested  the  narrow  stairca- 
notched  rock  by  which  alone  the  top  of  the  mesa  was  reached. 
When  the  people  returned  they  found  that  where  the  stairs  had  been, 
the  whole  side  of  the  mesa  was  gone,  and  had  fallen  in  a  heap  in 
the  valley  below.  The  place  was  absolutely  ina«  The 

three  women  could  be  seen  above,  wandering  around  the  edges, 
waving  their  arms  and  .shouting,  but  there  was  no  help.  The  city 
is  there,  just  as  it  was  left  so  many  years  ago,  and  the  skeletons  of 
the  three  women  lie  somewhere  undisturbed.  Nobody  has  been  upon 
the  Me>a  Knrantada  since  the  day  of  the  flood.  The  people  moved 

•  ma  and  began  again. 

ie  from  anything  Mr.  dishing  has  done  in  connection  with 
the  /ufiis,  just  south  of  here,  half  the  pages  of  this  volume  could 
readily  be  filled  with  sketches  of  this  interesting  people.  A  detailed 
account  of  c very-day  life  at  Acoma  alone  should  be  well  worth 
perusal.  There  is,  over  the  whole  story  of  the  Pueblos,  a  charm  of 
hospitality,  courage,  industry  and  love  of  home.  It  is  a  story  of 
ages  of  suffering  and  peril,  of  persecution  and  constancy.  The 
little  glimpses  of  their  rocky  homes  the  railroad  traveller  may  get  do 
not  tell  the  story.  The  Pueblos  are  the  remaining  representatives  of 
a  past  that  has  a  history  only  to  be  partially  known.  Through  all  this 
history  their  men  have  been  brave  and  their  women  virtuous.  They 
now  cling  to  their  fastnesses  from  association  and  the  love  of  home. 
They  present  the  only  instance  of  successful  communism.  They  are, 
and  have  always  been,  absolutely  independent  of  all  mankind  besides. 


0RIZ0NA. 


TVMNDLY  remember  as  you  pass  by, 
1*?^  that  Arizona  is  about  as  large  as 
New  York,  New  Jersey,  Pennsylvania, 
Delaware  and  Maryland  combined.  We 
are  not  going  to  see  it,  the  human  vision 
being  limited,  here  as  elsewhere,  to  a  few  miles.  The  Atlantic  and 
Pacific  railroad  is  but  two  lines  of  steel  and  a  right-of-way  across 
this  vast  territory  with  land  enough  for  an  empire,  and  the  puny 
effort  of  steam  and  steel  is  hardly  noticeable  to  the  soaring  bird 
amid  the  surrounding  immensity. 

We  are  in  a  region  now  compared  to  which  all  we  have  previously 
passed  is  comparatively  far  advanced  in  civilization.  This  is  a  land 
upon  which  the  sunrise  of  the  coming  time  is  just  breaking;  a  scene 
of  wide  pasture-lands,  vast  mountain-ranges  filled  with  ores,  lava- 
beds  which  seem  to  have  scorched  a  fiery  course  through  the  valleys 
in  comparatively  modern  times,  arid  wastes,  rushing  streams,  pine 
forests,  awful  gorges  like  that  of  the  Grand  Canyon,  caves,  petrified 

(101) 


!<>,>  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

forests,  rock-hewn  cities  perched  between  the  ledges  of  the  cliffs, 
and  all  brooded  over  by  the  monotony  of  a  vastness  and  silence  that 
makes  the  eyes  ache  and  the  senses  tired. 

It  is  also  the  residence,  time  immemorial,  of  tribes  and  peoples 
whose  history  is  speculated  upon,  but  really  unknown,  and  who 
differed  very  widely  from  each  other, in  language,  life,  disposition 
and  occupation.  The  Pueblos  are  perched  upon  their  hills,  while 
Navajoes  and  other  wandering  tribes,  all  enemies  to  these  shepherds 
and  farmers,  still  come  down  from  their  reservations  to  stare  at  the 
passing  trains,  wh.le  the  Moquis,  far  aloof,  seem  to  have  nothing  to- 
do  with  either  their  farming  brethren  or  the  savage  tribes,  and  the 
white  American,  making  his  little  ambitious  towns  in  the  heart  of  the 
desert,  is  the  manifest  heir  of  all. 

It  is  the  land  of  mountains.  Mexico  alone  can  offer  any  compar- 
ison to  it  in  this  respect.  Beginning  aim  .level  in  the  south- 
:hey  rise  higher  and  higher  until  i»  some  cases  they  are  lost  in 
the  clouds.  They  lie  sometimes  in  I  "it  most  frequently  in 
groups  and  ah  ^  in  the  San  Fran- 
cisco range,  north  of  Flagstaff,  they  rise  to  a  height  of  fourteen 
thousand  feet. 

These  mountains  all  seem  to  the  eye  to  be  brown  and  scorched; 
mere  masses  <>:  barren  and  so  big  as  to  be  repellent  from  the 

standpoint  of  usefulness  or  profit.  But  in  reality  they  are  largely 
covered  with  grass  and  timber,  and  are  watered  by  running  streams. 
Looked  at  from  the  car-windows  they  are  gigantic  monuments  to 
perpetual  desolation.  It  is  like  looking  at  the  full  moon.  It  is  plain 
enough,  but  you  can't  tell  from  looking  what  may  be  there.  The 
canyons,  at  least,  are  not  visible.  They  are  often  valleys  many  miles 
in  length,  completely  shut  in  from  the  outer  world,  thick  with  pines, 
having  running  streams,  and  even  cascades,  and  as  silent  as  a  land 
of  ghosts.  In  some  cases,  and  more  in  certain  groups  and  ranges 
than  in  others,  there  is  a  climate,  a  flora,  an  atmosphere,  that,  as 
compared  to  all  you  see  below,  make  another,  an  unsuspected,  and 


Arizona  Mountains. 


(103) 


104  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

delightful  world.  The  Indians  of  the  country  have  always  lived  in 
the  mountains  until  the  era  of  reservations  came,  and  lived  well. 
;ng  down  on  the  arid  plateaux  where  all  they  hated  was,  they 
felt  a  sense  of  security.  Nobody  could  follow  them  to  their  retreats. 
As  a  matter  of  fact  no  one  ever  has  followed  them  thither.  They 
were  only  in  danger  when  caught  before  they  could  get  home. 

There  are  in  some  of  these  mountains  wide  plains,  lying  at  an  ele- 
vation of  five  or  six  thousand  feet,  that  are  covered  with  fine  grasses 
and  crossed  by  unfailing  streams.  Out  of  these  plains  rise  still  other 
and  higher  peaks.  In  places  the  streams  have  cut  deep  gorges  and 
canyons,  and  in  others  they  have  widened  out  into  alluvial  vaK 

There  will  be  times  during  to-day  and  to-morrow  when  you  will 
know,  as  you  look  abroad,  and  with  a  personal  and  private  certainty 
that  you  do  not  propose  any  guide-book,  or  the  stories  of  any  old 
settler,  shall  cheat  you  of,  that  this  gigantic  panorama  of  mountain 
and  plain,  blazing  in  white  sunlight  and  uninhabited  as  the  sea,  is 
absolutely  worthless  for  all  the  purposes  of  human  occupancy.  In 
all  probability  you  wilt  be  mistaken.  They  are  improving  Arizona. 
It  was  improved  once  before,  and  knew  a  higher  civilization  than 
any  of  the  eastern  States  did  before  the  white  man  came.  Here  and 
there  in  various  localities  the  old  water-ways  are  visible  amii! 
and  cactus  and  There  were  hundreds  of  thousands  of  acres 

of  fruitful  land.  It  was  never  all  so.  Mountain  ridges  are  not  tii:- 
able  in  any  country.  The  huge  divides  h?.ve  been  washed  down  to 
the  bare  rock  by  the  storms  of  centuries.  But  this  same  washed 
soil,  deposited  in  lower  places,  is  the  most  fertile  known.  California 
is  a  lesson  to  the  whole  country  on  ways  of  procuring  water,  and 
places  that  have  long  been  abandoned  to  the  coyote  and  the  sage- 
hen,  and  are  all  the  more  desolate  now  from  having  once  been  in- 
habited, will  be  used  again  for  the  purposes  of  civilization.  There 
is  reason  for  the  conclusion  that  both  New  Mexico  and  Arizona  are 
to  be  coming  countries  for  the  home-seeking  class.  The  public  lands 
^re  gone  almost  everywhere  else.  The  achievements  of  these  home- 


ARIZONA. 


105 


making  people  are  such  as  to  give  assurance  of  success  where  success 
is  possible.  If  there  were  no  Apaches;  absolutely  none  on  reser- 
vations or  elsewhere  ;  the  advance-guard  would  already  be  in  these 
mountains.  Of  late  years  the  name  of  the  country  has  been  synony- 
mous with  Indian  outrage,  rapine  and  torture.  In  no  portion  of 
the  I'nited  States  has  there  been  a  more  persistent  struggle  against 
savagery.  When  some  future  historian  shall  have  collected  the  facts, 
if  one  ever  does,  the  tale  will  exceed  all  fiction. 
Isolation  and  Indians  are  two  words  that  portray 
the  history  of  Arizona  almost  up  to  date. 

The   territory   is,  excepting  the  comparatively 
small  area  included  in  Southern  California,  the 

south  -  western 
corner  of  the 
United  States. 
It  contains 
114,000  square 
miles, or  72,906,- 
240  acres.  This 
makes  it  as  large 
in  area  as  five 
or  six  ordinary 
States. 

The    size     of 

these  enormous  districts  of  almost  unsettled,  and  entirely  unde- 
veloped country,  has  much  to  do  with  the  future  of  the  great 
Republic.  It  is  only  by  comparisons  with  the  combined  areas 
of  other  States  that  we  know  all  about,  that  we  can  arrive  at  any 
fair  conception  of  the  enormous  scope  still  left  to  the  growing  mil- 
lions of  this  nation  before  the  time  prophesied  by  Macaulay  shall 
have  arrived. 

The  best  parts  of  Arizona  are  not  seen  from  any  railroad  as  yet 
built.     One  half  the  area  of  the  northern  half  is  a  plateau  lying  at 


An  Arizona  Valley. 


106 


OVERLAND   GUIDE. 


an  elevation  of  6,000  feet.  The  surface  of  this  is  diversified  by 
occasional  peaks  and  isolated  ranges  and  is  covered  with  fine  grasses 
and  crossed  by  streams.  There  is  through  this  portion  of  the  ter- 
ritory a  long  line  of  extinct  volcanoes,  and  lava-fields  are  scattered 
here  and  there. 

The  south-western  portion  is  mostly  a  succession  of  sandy  plains; 
not  deserts  in  any  strict  sense,  since  both  the  Yuma,  or  Colorado, 
and  Mojave  plains  are  covered  in  places  with  grass.  Both  these  are 
considered  and  called  "  deserts "  both  by  geographers 
and  locally.  They  are  divided  one  from  the 
other  by  a  range  of  mountains,  being 
otherwise  continous,  and  across  the 
upper  one,  the  "  Mojave  Desert,"  the 
Atlantic  and  Pacific  road  is  laid. 

In  Arizona  the  great  record  of  the 
primeval  world  lies  open,  with  the 
story    of   the   ages 
upon  its  pages.     It 
was  once  a  Paleo- 
zoic sea,  on  whose 
waters  no  ship  ever 
sailed,    on     whose 

shores  no  man  trod.  w.t«r  worn 

It  is  a  land  of  revelations  to  the  geologist.  Nowhere  can  the  past  be 
traced  more  distinctly.  There  are  everywhere  the  marks  of  water. 
Its  erosions  are  on  the  cliffs  and  in  t'he  canyons.  You  can  see  them 
miles  away,  and  close  beside  the  track.  Some  of  the  grinding  was 
done  by  the  lapping  waves  of  the  ancient  sea,  some  is  the  rgsult  of 
floods,  oft  repeated  in  later  ages,  and  some  of  the  fantastic  carving 
was  not  done  by  either,  but  by  nature's  gigantic  sandblast;  the  wan- 
dering winds  of  solitude,  bearing  with  them  the  sharp  sand  gathered 
from  the  ground,  have  in  the  course  of  time  cut  the  cliffs  and  "  mon- 
uments" into  those  fantastic  shapes,  and  the  process  is  still  going  on. 


ARIZONA.  107 

The  later  history  of  Arizona  is  the  same,  in  all  essential  features, 
with  that  of  New  Mexico.  Arizona  remained  part  of  that  territory 
until  as  late  .as  1863.  It  was  a  portion  of  the  "  Gadsden  purchase" 
of  1854.  At  the  close  of  the  Mexican  war  there  were  almost  no 
white  people  here,  and  fifteen  years  ago  the  Apache  was  lord  of  all. 
The  building  of  the  railroad  was  almost  the  first  dawn  of  the  modern 
era.  The  Pueblos,  almost  destroyed  by  centuries  of  savage  depre- 
dation, afforded  the  only  glimpses  of  industrial  life  at  its  advent.  It 
.seems  almost  an  intrusion  still.  The  palace-car  is  an  anachronism. 
The  sensations  induced  by  the  curious  situation  may  not  occur  to 
everyone;  they  are  dulled  by  use.  But,  when  darkness  and  silence 
have  shut  in  the  scene,  one  lies  in  his  bed  and  listens  to  the  ring  of 
the  wheel  upon  the  rail,  and  knows  that  the  headlight  flashes  across 
the  waste,  that  the  whistle  awakes  echoes  silent  always  until  now, 
and  wonders  at  the  boldness  that  has  caused  so  incongruous  a  thing 
as  a  railroad  train  to  dash  across  these  uninhabited  silences.  In  old 
times  they  did  not  make  missionaries  of  wrought  iron  and  polished 
brass.  The  world  has  changed. 

Taking  up  the  thread  of  travel  again,  we  pass,  ten  miles  west  of 
Coolidge,  the  little  station  called  WINGATE.  Three  miles  south  of 
this,  and  distinct  in  the  sunshine,  is  the  military  post  of  Fort  Win- 
gate.  It  looks  a  pleasant  place,  and  presents  at  least  one  isolated 
:spot  where  all  the  refinements  of  eastern  civilization  may  be  found. 
Close  beside  it  stands  the  curious,  cathedral-shaped  rock  known  as 
"  Navajo  Church."  Sometimes  the  books  of  travel  have  in  all  seri- 
ousness spoken  of  this  as  an  actual  ruin.  It  is  simply  a  huge  rock 
that,  in  the  vernacular  of  the  region,  "  got  left "  in  some  convulsion 
or  erosion  that  tore  down  the  remainder  of  the  ledge. 

About  forty  miles  from  Wingate  is  Zuni  (Zoon-ye)  the  Pueblo 
town  and  tribe  so  extensively  advertised  by  Mr.  Gushing.  So  ex- 
tensively has  this  already  been  done,  that  it  is  not  worth  while  to 
linger  upon  the  subject  here. 

Gallup  station  is  a  place    of   coal.      But    the    character  of  the 


ARIZONA.  109 

deposit  changes  here,  and  this  is  a  lignite,  or  brown  coal,  of  a  not 
extraordinarily  good  quality. 

For  a  long  distance  here  we  traverse  the  valley  of  the  Rio  Puerco 
(Ree-o\\  P'7£^rco).  You  may  not  be  able  to  discover  this  fact  by 
simply  looking  at  it,  for  nothing  looking  much  like  a  river  is  visible. 
But  there  is  an  indefinitely  defined  valley,  arable  land,  and  water 
somewhere.  The  \\M(\  pucrco  means  filthy,  dirty,  foul.  It  is  one  of 
the  strong  terms  of  the  Spanish.  It  also  commonly  designates  a 
pig,  and  isakin  to  our  work  "pork.1  Twining  and  bending  endlessly 
through  New  Mexico,  this  Puerco  River  is  a  very  long  one,  though 
you  can  with  difficulty  see  it.  It  has  been  a  source  of  life  to  many 
generations  of  Pueblos,  and  its  valley  has  always  been  a  centre  of 
population.  k 

The  curious  and  hideous  heaps  of  black  rock  you  have  observed 
by  the  roadside  are  pure  lava.  Except  to  crack  in  cooling,  most 
of  it  that  is  visible  lies  where  it  was  originally  deposited.  It 
seems  to  have  been  a  comparatively  recent  flow,  but  in  reality  it  is 
not.  Nothing  in  Ari/ona  looked  as  it  does  now  when  this  red-hot 
stream  flowed  down  the  valley.  Nine-tenths  of  it  is  long  since  cov- 
ered up.  It  is  only  that  some  of  it  is  exposed  here  that  it  seems  pecul- 
iarly a  volcanic  country  in  this  immediate  neighborhood.  If  you 
climb  to  the  summit  of  San  Francisco  Mountain,  you  can  look  down 
into  the  parched  throats  of  a  hundred  craters. 

Immediately  north  of  the  station  of  Gallup,  and  some  fifty  miles 
distant,  is  the  enormous  reservation  of  the  Navajoe  Indians  (N'av- 
ah-hoe).  These  often  come  down  to  some  one  of  the  various  sta- 
tions south  of  them,  and  display  their  only  interest  in  civilization  by 
looking  at  the  trains.  There  is  no  telling  what  they  think  of  the  in- 
novation. They  can  speak  Spanish  a  little  if  they  wish,  but  are  in- 
variably entirely  non-committal  as  to  all  personal  opinions.  The 
Pueblos  often  come  also.  There  are  certain  signs  by  which  the 
stranger  can  readily  tell  the  difference  between  them.  The  Pueblo 
woman  has  always  her  hair  banged.  They  started  the  bang  several 


ARIZONA. 


Ill 


hundreds  or  thousands  of  years  ago,  and  it  gives  their  faces  a  stupid 
look.  They  also  wear  thick  casings  of  buckskin  upon  their  legs,  giv- 
ing these  from  the  knee  down  the  thickness  of  ordinary  fence-posts. 
When  we  reach  the  open  plain  near  what  is  called  the  Continental 
Divide,  we  shall  see  on  the  north  side  of  the  track  some  of  the  curious 
work  of  the  water.  For  several  miles  there  is  a  line  of  red  and  gray 
palisades.  Sometimes  the  face  is  marked  by  a  long  and  narrow 


Isolated  Rocks;  Casa  Grande. 

streak  of  white.  Sometimes  there  is  a  coping  of  green,  and  here  and 
there  an  isolated  mass  stands  out  in  the  plain.  This  is  a  case  where 
a  portion  of  the  mass  "  got  left,"  again.  It  is  evident  that  the  plain 
was  once  covered  clear  across  by  these  strata. 

HOLBROOK  is  an  eating  station,  and  sixty  miles  west  of  there  what 
is  called  in  not  very  choice  .Spanish  Canyon  Diablo  (De-0//-blo) 
is  passed.  The  name  means  "  Devil  Canyon,"  and  the  place  is 


ARIZONA.  113 

simply  a  hideous  gash  in  the  face  of  nature  540  feet  wide  and  222  feet 
deep,  and  running  for  miles  across  the  plain.  The  edges  are  level 
with  the  surface  of  the  country,  and  at  a  little  distance  it  cannot  be 
seen  at  all.  If  it  were  closed  up  the  projections  on  one  edge  would 
fit  with  tolerable  accuracy  the  notches  on  the  other.  It  was  caused 
simply  by  a  contraction  and  cracking  of  the  surface  of  the  earth  in 
cooling.  So,  on  a  much  grander  scale,  was  the  Grand  Canyon  off 
the  Colorado. 

From  this  point  San  Francisco  Mountain  can  be  distinctly  seen, 
being  the  easternmost  one  of  the  group  composed  of  Kendrick's 
IVuk,  Challender  Peak,  Mt.  Sitgreaves,  and  furthest  to  the  west, 
Antelope  Peak.  These  form  the  San  Francisco  Mountains,  shading 
off  into  the  plateau  with  numerous  smaller  elevations. 

And  here  the  country  begins  to  change  into  something  the  trav- 
eller does  not  expect.  It  becomes,  and  continues  for  many  miles,  a 
beautiful  pine  forest.  The  ground  is  covered  with  a  thick  growth 
of  grass.  There  is  to  the  eye  scarcely  a  more  attractive  country  in 
all  the  W 

Flagstaff  is  a  brisk  little  town  with  an  eccentric  name,  and  is  a 
lumber  capital.  They  are  cutting  out  the  yellow  pine  as  fast  as  pos- 
sible, not  for  the  sake  of  clearing  the  land,  but  for  lumber.  As  for 
the  soil,  it  is  not  as  good  as  that  of  some  of  the  most  unprepossessing 
of  the  country  we  have  been  riding  through  all  day.  No  means  has 
thus  far  been  devised  of  obtaining  water.  There  are  few  streams, 
and  all  that  lies  beneath  seems  to  be  volcanic  rock  of  the  hardest 
variety.  It  is  a  country  of  great  natural  beauty,  lying  some  seven 
thousand  feet  above  sea-level,  and  a  health  resort,  but  agriculturally, 
or  even  for  very  extensive  grazing,  nearly,  or  entirely,  worthless. 

Eight  miles  south-east  fromFlagstaff,and  across  a  beautiful  timbered 
park,  lie  the  famous  cliff-dwellings.  There  is  an  enormous  canyon, 
the  walls  of  which  are  composed  of  rough  sandstone.  It  is  in  these 
walls  that  the  dwellings  are  found.  They  occupy  a  space  in  both 
sides-of  the  canyon  where  a  soft  layer  lies  between  two  harder  ones, 


114  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

making,  from  crumbling  and  falling  out,  or  being  easily  displaced,  a 
niche  or  space.  A  rough  wall  laid  in  clay,  and  extending  from  the 
front  of  the  lower  to  the  upper  ledge,  formed  the  fronts  of  the  dwell- 
ings. These  rooms  are  extensive  enough  to  have  sheltered  an  ex- 
tensive population,  and,  being  situated  about  half-way  up  the  wall, 
were,  while  not  inaccessible,  easily  defended.  The  remains  found  in 
the  long-ago-abandoned  dwellings  are  of  such  articles  as  arc  now 
in  common  use  among  the  Pueblos.  The  only  difference  seems  to 
consist  in  the  fact  that  wooden  articles  found  have  been  cut  with  a 
stone  axe.  This  means  only  antiquity.  IUit  the  articles  unearthed 
from  the  works  of  the  Mound-Builders  east  of  the  Mississippi  are 
:ch  as  the  Puebl<  :;larity  extends  to  small  de- 

There  are  those  who  are  firm  in  the  belief  that  all  one  may 
see  at  Yslela.  <.r  Tesuque,  or  Laguna,  or  Acoma,  «>r  here  in  the  sides 
of  the  canyon -walls,  has  a  direct  connection  with  the  curious  tumuli 
that  have  puzzled  the  antiquarians  ever  since  they  were  discovered. 
This  Pueblo,  A  '.tec,  Mound-Builder,  or  whatever  he  may  be, 

is  the  most  interesting  .and   sorrowful   human   en  w   known. 

The  remains  and  traditions  of  departed  greatness  hang  about  him 
unexplained.  There  is  a  peculiar  pathos  about  an  expiring  race. 
There  is  something  far  more  pathetic  than  entertaining  in  these  de- 
serted cliff-dwellings,  perched  between  heaven  and  earth  in  a  lonely 
canyon,  old  and  futile  refuges  against  the  rapine  that  finally  almost 
destroyed  the  race. 

In  the  immediate  vicinity  of  these  cliff-dwellings,  but  out  in  the 
plain,  there  are  other  remains  of  a  city.  Remains  of  pottery  and 
domestic  utensils  offer  convincing  evidence  that  the  same  people 
occupied  both  places. 

>ut  eight  miles  north-east  of  Flagstaff,  a  small  and  isolated 
mountain  stands  in  the  plain.  On  the  south  front  the  volcanic  rock 
is  full  of  cavities,  round  in  form,  that  are  actually  the  blow-holes  of 
a  gigantic  piece  of  slag.  Some  of  these  globular  cavities  are 
twenty-five  feet  in  diameter.  All  of  these  were  a  long  time 


ARIZONA. 


115 


inhabited.     They    were    reached    by   steps,   and    sometimes   were 
walled  in  front. 

The    "  Petrified    Forest "    lies   a   few   miles    from  the  station  of 


The  Cliff  Dwellings,  Arizona. 

HOLBROOK.     It    lies  over   an   extent  of   several   miles.     The  trees 
are  many  of  them  of  large  size,  and  their  varieties  have  not  been. 


116  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

definitely  decided  upon.  One  of  the  flinty  trunks  is  ten  feet  in 
diameter.  Limbs  and  branches,  petrified  into  solid  rock,  lie  scattered 
in  all  directions.  Every  color  found  in  nature  is  reproduced  in  this 
agatized  wood,  and  it  has  become  an  article  of  trade  in  the  form  of 
jewelry. 

There  is  a  natural  bridge  in  Arizona,  in  comparison  with  which 
that  of  Virginia  becomes  hardly  worth  mentioning.  It  is  not  acces- 
sible from  the  railroad,  and  is  merely  mentioned  as  one  of  the  freaks 
orange  country  is  capable  of.  It  lies  in  what  is  called  the 
Tonto  Basin,  in  the  south-eastern  part  of  the  enormous  county  of 
Yavapai  (Yava-//-ee),  itself  containing  something  near  thirty  thousand 
square  miles.  (Massachusetts  contains  only  seven  thousand  eight 
hundred,  and  the  State  of  Maine  is  only  a  little  bigger  than  Yavapai, 
having  an  area  of  about  thirty-five  thousand  square  miles.) 

A  man  may  stand  on  the  crown  of  this  bridge  and  not  know  it, 
for  there  are  about  sixty  acres  of  it,  and  some  of  this  is  cultivated 
ground.  It  has  a  span  of  eighty  feet,  and  its  width  is  a  hundred  and 
fifty  yards.  There  is  a  round  hole  in  the  middle  of  the  arch  through 
which  one  can  look  at  the  stream  below.  The  gigantic  limestone 
walls  spring  in  perfect  curves  to  the  perfect  arch  above. 

A  weird  and  uncanny  region  must  be  what  is  called  "  The  Painted 
Desert."  It  is  a  wild  and  desolate  plateau,  also  in  Yavapai  County, 
but  in  the  north-eastern  part.  It  is  absolutely  destitute  of  water  or 
vegetation,  and  its  surface  is  covered  with  columns,  isolated  peaks, 
and  buttes,  all  sandstone,  and  worn  into  fantastic  shapes  by  the 
wind;— the  sand-blast.  The  peculiarity  of  this  desert  consists  in  its 
wonderful  mirages.  There  are  depicted  there  palaces,  gardens, 
colonnades,  temples,  fountains,  lakes,  islands,  fortifications,  woods, 
groves,  orchards,  men  and  women,  herds  of  cattle,  etc.  The 
Indians  are  superstitious  about  it,  and  have  always  carefully 
avoided  it. 

This  mirage  sometimes  plays  fantastic  pranks  with  the  ordinary 
senses  of  the  traveller  in  other  parts  of  Arizona  and  New  Mexico. 


ARIZONA. 


117 


A  beautiful  lake,  with  islands,  a  port  and  town,  sailboats,  and  trees 
on   the   shore,  may  occur  at  any   moment  beside  the  track.    The 


illusion  is  perfect,  except  that  it  is  too  pretty  for  the  actual  thing. 
The  mirage  has  a  most  prosaic  explanation  too.     It  is  nothing  but 


113 


OVERLAND   GUIDE. 


-  of  rarified  air  rising  from  the  heated  ground.     Any  one  who- 
looks  across  the  top  of  a  heated  cooking-range   through  an  open 

window  can  at  any  time 
have  a  modified  and 
imperfect  miroge  for 
himself. 

Perhaps  the  best 
country  in  Arizona  is 
that  nursery  of  thieves, 
the  San  Carlos  Indian 
Reservation.  It  is  on 
the  San  Carlos  River 
that  so  manV  remains 
of  an  ancient  civiliza- 
tion are  found.  The 
ruined  irrigating  chan- 
nels and  dwellings  that 
line  its  banks  show  that 
a  large  population  once 
lived  here. 

THE  GRAND  CANVON 
of  the  COLORADO  may 
be  reached  most  agree- 
ably from  the  town 
of  Flagstaff,  though 
the  distance  is  much 
greater  than  from 
Peach  Springs,  which 
is  the  nearest  station 
.on  the  A.  \-  P.  road  to 
the  great  southward  bend  the  gorge  makes  on  the  western  border 
of  the  Territory.  The  ride  from  Peach  Springs  is  only  some 
twenty  miles,  but  it  is  a  rough  road  even  for  Arizona.  From 


ARIZONA.  H9» 

Flagstaff  it  is  some  sixty-five  miles,  but  it  is  a  most  enjoyable  Sum- 
mer trip  through  heavy  pine  country,  over  a  fairly  good  road, 
and  in  a  grass  country.  It  means  camping  and  some  hardship,  in 
any  event,  and  should  not  be  undertaken  by  invalids,  or  by  ladies 
who  are  not  accustomed  to  roughing  it.  A  railroad  from  Flagstaff 
has  been  for  some  time  contemplated,  and  when  built  will  offer  facili- 
ties for  visiting  a  piece  of  scenery  that  has  no  rival  in  the  world,  and 
that  is  worth  the  journey  hither  many  times  over. 

There  is  no  intention  here  of  attempting  to  describe  the  Grand 
Canyon.  Such  efforts,  thus  far,  have  been  invariably  thrown  away. 
A  friend  of  the  author  once  told  him  the  following  story,  which  is 
only  repeated  here  to  illustrate  the  uselessness  of  talking  about  a 
place  which  is  far  beyond  any  descriptive  power,  and  which,  as  a 
noticeable  fact,  no  one  talks  much  about  after  seeing  it. 

These  two  gentlemen  were  Knglishnu-n.  When  they  had  alighted 
from  the  wagon  and  gone  to  the  edge  of  the  canyon,  they  for  awhile 
stood  silent.  Then  one  of  them  ejaculated  "Well, — I'll  bed — d!" 
The  other  had  meantime  seated  himself  upon  a  convenient  boulder, 
and  was  weeping  like  a  broken-hearted  girl.  The  scene  that  affects 
men's  nerves  like  this,  and  causes  them  to  utter  inane  ejaculations  or 
weep,  it  is  useless  to  dwell  upon  in  types. 

But,  at  least,  let  no  one  imagine  that  the  Grand  Canyon  is  "pretty." 
That  it  is  awful  there  can  be  no  question,  and  it  makes  an  impression 
that  is  never  recovered  from.  No  one  has  ever  seen  it  all,  except 
possibly  Major  Powell.  When  you  have  exhausted  all  the  time  at 
your  disposal,  you  must  remember  that  there  are  still  hundreds  of 
miles  of  it  to  be  seen,  for  the  chasm  is  four  hundred  miles  in  length. 
Canyon  is  not  a  fit  name  for  it,  as  its  heights  and  depths  must  be 
measured,  not  in  feet,  or  by  ordinary  standards,  but  by  miles.  As 
you  look  down  from  the  top  the  chasm  is  a  measureless  abyss.  As 
you  look  upward  from  the  bottom  the  awful  walls  overwhelm  you. 
The  river  that  has  its  channel  between  is  not  a  puny  stream,  for  the 
Colorado  is  more  than  1,500  miles  in  length,  and  the  area  drained 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


by  it  is  larger  than  the  States  of  Pennsylvania,  Virginia,  and  all  New 
England  combined.  There  are  no  actual  falls  in  the  Grand  Canyon, 
and  if  there  were  they  would  be  the  mightiest  of  the  world:  but 


-where  the  Canyon  narrows  the  mighty*  stream  rages  through  its 
narrow  gateways  with  terrific  force.  Floods  raise  it  sometimes 
seventy  feet  in  a  few  hours. 

All  the  Canyon,  and  all  the  world  around  it,  is  rock.     It  is  unin- 


ARISONA.  121 

habited  save  by  a  few  Indians,  and  uninhabitable.  Domes,  cliffs, 
fantastic  monuments,  sheer  walls,  cracks  appear  everywhere.  The 
half  of  it  is  not  known;  nine-tenths  of  it  has  never  been  seen  by  white 
men.  It  impresses  all.  No  man  is  so  dull  as  to  escape  its  fascina- 
tion. A  frontiersman  of  the  old  times  told  the  author  twenty  years 
ago  that  he  had  travelled  and  lurked  three  days  amongst  the  hostile 
Indians  of  those  times  to  get  a  view  of  it,  and  that  he  went  again 
and  again,  though  as  he  expressed  it,  "  I  had  to  crawl  on  my  belly 
to  git  thar." 

Geologically,  the  Grand  Canyon  is  a  crack,  and  has  been  there 
since  the  world  cooled.  The  river  did  not  wear  the  channel  there, 
but  simply  flowed  into  and  through  it  when  the  time  for  rivers 
came. 

Some  time  the  place  will  be  better  known  ;  this  upon  the  sup- 
position that  it  is  possible  to  know  a  place  of  such  proportions, 
where  all  ordinary  chasms  and  gorges  would  be  lost  and  never  even 
observed.  The  chasm  below  the  falls  at  Niagara  might  be  swallowed 
up  in  a  side-canyon  here,  and  its  existence  never  be  suspected. 

Beyond  Flagstaff  the  road  lies  in  the  heart  of  characteristic 
mountain  scenery.  Beyond  the  station  of  WILLIAMS  the  descent  to 
the  valley  of  the  Colorado  is  rapid.  If  it  is  daylight,  the  difficulties 
that  were  overcome  in  the  construction  of  the  road  are  very  apparent. 
But,  however  they  may  have  seemed  to  the  engineers,  they  are 
very  pleasant  to  the  traveller.  They  convey  the  impression  that 
the  Atlantic  &  Pacific  road  was  built  in  the  only  place  possible,  and 
looking  back  causes  a  mental  question  as  to  how  this  one  route  was 
ever  found.  There  are  not  many  landmarks  except  to  some  accom- 
plished mountaineer.  It  is  all  pine  and  rock  and  chasm.  But  Bill 
Williams's  Peak  looks  blue  above  the  rest  on  the  left.  The  inquiry 
naturally  is  as  to  the  history  of  a  man  who  has  a  mountain  named 
for  him.  He  seems  to  have  been  a  pioneer  of  strong  character  who 
impressed  himself  upon  his  local  surroundings,  and  more  than  this 
of  him  seems  dimly  traditional. 


OVERLAND   (il'IDE. 


PRESCOTT  JUNC- 
TION, a  station  near 
the  western  end  of 
Picacho  Canyon,  and 
some  fifty  miles  from 
the  dining-station  of 
WILLIAMS,  is  the  junc- 
tion-point for  I' 

i ,  the  capital  city 
of  the  Territory,  by 
way  of  the  Prescott 
\-  Arizona  Central 
Railroad. 

It  is  one  thousand 
four  hundred  and 
seventy-six  miles  from 
the  Missouri  River  to 
the  western  boundary 
line  of  Arizona,  and 
the  Colorado  River. 
A-  the  train  glides 
downward  toward  this 
unpicturesque  and 
useless  river,  dash- 
ing its  ashen  waves 
against  the  piles  of 
the  long  bridge,  the 
surroundings  have 
grown  curiously  un- 
attractive. Scurrying 
through  the  willow- 
clumps,  or  rubbing 
sleepy  eyes  at  the 


ARIZONA. 


123 


•door  of  the  wickiup,  you  may  catch  glimpses  of  almost  naked 
Indians.  You  will  see  them  again,  to  the  entire  satisfaction  of  any 
reasonable  curiosity,  when  the  train  has  crossed  the  bridge. 

THE  NEEDLES  takes  its  curious  name  from  some  sharp  peaks  on  the 
Arizona  side  and  some  fifteen  miles  away  at  the  northern  end  of  what 
is  called  the  Mojave  (Mo-/W/-ve)  Range.  They  stand  on  the  left 
before  reaching  the  river.  The  town  is  celebrated  for  a  climate  of 
almost  unvarying  torridness,  for  its  surroundings  of  sandy  and  lava- 
. strewn  desolation,  and  its  convenience  as  a  loafing  place  for  the 


Indians  of  the  region.  Otherwise  it  is  a  railroad  town  entirely,  a 
changing-place  for  engines,  etc.  As  a  dining-station  it  has  attrac- 
tions. The  only  ice  ever  seen  here  appears  on  the  table,  and  the 
profusion  of  luscious  fruits  proclaims  our  nearness,  at  last,  to  the 
vineyards  and  orchards  of  Southern  California. 

The  Colorado  reminds  one  of  the  Missouri,  except  that  the  current 
is  very  much  less  sluggish.  Its  peculiar  color  is  obtained  after  it 
leaves  the  Canyon,  and  there  its  waters  are  amber-color,  or  white. 
Next  to  the  Columbia  the  Colorado  is  the  principal  tributary  to  the 
Pacific  on  the  continent.  It  was  first  discovered  by  one  Fernando 


l'J4  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

Alarcon,  May  pth,  1540.  He  ascended  it  in  boats  as  far  as  the 
Grand  Canyon,  and  is  probably  one  of  the  few  people  who  ever  did, 
for  it  is  one  of  the  most  unnavigable  and  capricious  streams  on  the 
continent.  Where  it  ran  last  year  is  this  year  a  fertile  bottom  over- 
grown with  swamp-grass,  tall  weeds,  and  willow-clumps. 


A 


One  of  the  Wild  Oi 


The  Indians  you  see  at  The  Needles  are  Mojaves.  There  are  only 
some  eight  hundred  of  them  altogether,  but  there  are  about  two 
hundred  more  known  as  Chim-e-hu-vis,  who  live  with  them.  The 
Mojaves  are,  as  to  stature  and  proportion,  not  bad-looking; — for 


ARIZONA. 


125- 


Indians.  They  were  once  a  fighting  people,  and  gave  a  good  deal  of 
trouble  until  1859,  when  a  certain  Colonel  Hoffman,  of  the  regular 
service,  gave  them  so  crushing  a 
defeat  that  they  have  been  ever 
since  about  as  you  see  them  now. 
Morally  they  are  considered  to 
be  very  low  in  the  scale.  Contact 
with  the  whites  has  brought  dis- 
ease, idleness,  whiskey,  loaferism 
and  beggary.  They  are  now  an  in- 
significant band  of  tatterdema-  ^ 
lions,  amusing  and  disgusting 
alike  to  overland  passengers  at 
The  Needles.  Studied  at  cW 
quarters  the  best  specimens  of 
the  Noble  Red  Man  lack  a  good 
deal  of  filling  the  ideal  of  old- 
fashioned  poetry  and  Cooper's 
novels.  They  are  all  rancid. 
These  Mojaves  are  neither  the 
best  nor  the  worst. 

There  are  two  or  three  of  themx 
ordinary  habitues  of  this  little 
town  whom  you  will  not  find  it 
difficult  to  carry  away  with  you  in 
your  mind.  One  of  them  is  the 
belle.  She  wears  a  hoop-skirt 
under  a  calico  petticoat,  and  a 
gorgeous  mantle  made  of  cotton  ?J 
handkerchiefs  that  have  not  been 
cut  apart.  Bare-legged,  bare-  Ari20na  Belle' 

footed,  bare-bodied  and  bare-headed,  the  remainder  of  her  attire 
is  not  worth  mentioning. 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


Another  is  the  Old  Squaw.  You  cannot  imagine  until  you  see 
her,  what  texture  the  human  skin  may  take  when  uncovered  for  half 
or  three-quarters  of  a  century.  It  is  simply  living  leather,  and  hang- 
ing in  tough  wrinkles  and  folds,  is  a  modification  only  of  the  hide  of 
a  rhinoceros.  Her  breasts  hang  down  to  her  waist,  callous  like  the 

rest.  Her  feet  and 
legs  are  indifferent 
to  thorns.  Heavy 
gray  hair  covers  her 
head  and  hangs  in 
uncombed  masses. 
She  is  a  hardened 
and  brazen  old 
creature,  strong  and 
straight,  unabashed 
by  the  presence  of 
strangers;  an  epi- 
K  fome  and  abridge- 

„  /  T^S^O  'T  ment  of  a" one  has 

ever   heard   or  read 

4-W*y      ,    \    <'wfi*  of    of    the    chiefest 

•V  >'  barbarian    of     them 

^      all;— The  Squaw. 

The  Yuma  tribe, 
just  below,  seem  akin 
to  these.  They  also 
were  once  strong  and 
warlike,  but  since 
1851  have  been  peaceful  on  account  of  having  had  a  chastisement  at 
the  hands  of  one  Colonel  Heintzelman.  The  old  Fort,  historic  as  the 
place  the  dead  soldier  came  back  to  from  hades  after  his  blankets, 
and  built  to  hold  in  check  this  once  powerful  tribe,  is  now  occupied 
by  the  Indians  themselves.  Like  the  Mojaves  they  are  passing  away. 


An  Old   Settler 


8ALIF0RNIA. 


fTHE  crossing  of  the  Colorado,  at  The  Needles,  is  very  nearly  at 
the  junction  point  of  Arizona,  Nevada  and  California.  The 
town  is  in  the  huge  county  of  San  Bernardino,  and  the  track  lies 
in  this  county  almost  to  Los  Angeles,  about  three  hundred  miles. 

It  is  a  very 
unprepossess- 
ing entrance 
intotheGolden 
State,  for  here 
begins  a  semi- 
desert  consid- 
erably more 
barren  than 
anything  thus 
far  encounter- 
ed on  the  jour- 
ney. By  a 
peculiar  dis- 
pensation of 

Providence  each  transcontinental  line 
crosses  one   of  these,   some    better, 
some  worse.     This  is  reputed  easiest 
of  all.     Going  to  Southern  California 
first,  and  making  the  journey  by  way  of  Los  Angeles, 
there  is  one  hundred  and  seventy  miles  of  it  from 
The  Needles  to  Barstow,  where  the  train   turns- 
southward  through  the  Cajon  (Cah-hone;  a  box,)  pass  into  the  San 
Gabriel  Valley. 

In  midsummer  this  half-day's  ride,  or  more,  is  very  warm.    But  it  is 
9  (127) 


128  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

not  necessary  to  believe  that  clouds  of  sand  will  drift  with  the  wind, 
or  that  the  heat  has  any  stifling  qualities.  Many  an  eastern  journey 
has  both  more  heat  and  more  dust  in  it.  Many  who  are  unused  to 
such  scenes  nndTan  enjoyment  in  it  through  contrast  with  all  the 
journeys  ever  made  before.  This  is  something  like  what  may  be 
expected  : — 

There  is  rock,  cactus,  volcanic  scoria,  sage-brush,  eternal  sunshine 
and  absolute  silence.  Save  where  at  long  distances  apart  some  little 
sign  of  water  has  made  a  cluster  of  human  habitations,  there  seems 
to  be  no  inhabitant  of  earth  or  air.  The  thickest  of  the  stunted 
herbage  is  called  "sage,"  and  seeming  to  be  always  dead  and  never 
green,  it  grows  upon  a  soil  that  is  not  soil  at  all,  but  a  species  of 
concrete.  What  grass  there  is  grows  in  bunches.  The  region 
oppresses,  while  it  interests  you.  Vast  masses  of  mountain  lie  all 
around,  hazy-blue  with  distance.  Gaunt  cacti  sway  and  nod  in  the 
idle  wind.  Forests  of  the  curious  yucca  palm  appear  at  intervals, 
some  day  to  be  all  cut  down  and  taken  away  for  the  manufacture  of 
paper.  There  may  be  rarely  a  gray  coyote,  looking  behind  him, 
and  seeming  to  smile  when  he  lolls  his  red  tongue.  Occasionally  a 
jackass  rabbit  lays  his  long  ears  down,  and  makes  a  gray  streak  of 
himself  as  he  departs  for  some  locality  where  there  are  fewer  myste- 
rious rumblings  and  less  smoke.  The  effects  of  the  sunshine  are 
something  like  those  of  the  electric  light;  the  lights  are  intensely 
brilliant  and  the  shadows  black.  The  scene  is  not  wanting  in  a 
weird  and  mysterious  charm.  Silence,  loneliness  and  vastness,  have 
the  effect  of  entertaining  and  pleasing,  where  there  is  no  danger 
and  little  discomfort,  and  where  by  simply  sitting  still  the  panorama 
will  unwind  itself  and  pass  away.  This  lacks  only  yellow  sand  and 
a  string  of  laden  camels,  instead  of  ice-water  and  the  luxurious 
interior  of  a  Pullman  car,  to  give  one  all  that  sense  of  solitude,  that 
feeling  of  the  danger  of  being  lost,  that  utter  isolation,  the  pilgrim  to 
Mecca  must  have  as  he  crosses  the  wastes  of  the  Sahara. 

Sometimes,  far  ahead,  a  brown  dot  in  the  landscape  indicates  a 


CALIFORNIA. 


129 


station-house.  One  of  them,  for  some  unknown  reason,  is  called 
Bagdad.  Another  is  called  Siberia,  possibly  because  it  is  the  hottest 
place  on  the  road.  But  Ash  Hill  was  named  in  good  faith. 

It  is  deemed  not  improbable  that  water  can  be  procured  here  by 
boring  wells,  and  people  who  have  had  their  lessons  about  deserts 
are  looking  forward  to  the  time  when  at  least  a  portion  of  this  may 


The  De$«rt. 

be  made  not  only  inhabitable,  but 
very  fruitful.  Climate  is  the  chief 
inducement  to  these  speculations. 
Yet,  except  in  nooks  and  corners, 
it  is  not  free  from  frost. 

BARSTOW,  the  junction-point 
for  Southern  California  direct, 
forms  the  terminus  of  our  west- 
ward journey.  The  place  is  one 
thousand  six  hundred  and  forty-five  miles  from  the  Missouri.  Here 
the  cars  destined  for  Los  Angeles  and  San  Diego  turn  directly  south- 
ward. It  is  the  end  of  the  desert.  By  a  contrast  and  transition  so 
striking  as  to  be  almost  marvelous,  you  stand  at  this  lonely  little 


130  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

desert  station  almost  upon  the  verge  of  a  country  where  all  the- 
products  of  two  zones  grow  side  by  side,  with  a  luxuriance  unknown 
elsewhere  on  the  globe,  and  beneath  a  climate  that  within  the  past 
five  years  has  attracted  tens  of  thousands  of  permanent  residents. 

If  in  Winter  you  go  south  into  Southern  California  from  the  main 
line  of  the  Atlantic  &:  Pacific  at  Barstow,  you  will  find  the  north- 
ern side  of  the  San  Bernardino  Range  to  be  frosty.  The  beautiful 
mountain  scenery  of  that  range,  though  green  with  grass,  pines,  and 
the  variety  of  California  shrubs,  may  be  flecked  with  snow. 

The  moment  one  has  emerged  from  Cajon  Pass  on  the  southern 
side,  however,  the  scene  changes,  and  one  enters  the  now  famous  cli- 
mate of  Southern  California. 

The  situation  is  peculiar.  Climates  are  not  ordinarily  capable  of 
being  fenced.  This  is.  The  San  Bernardino  Range  runs  almost 
east  and  west,  with  a  trend  toward  the  south-east.  It  is  the  barrier 
which  fences  off  all  that  may  be  found  inhospitable,  in  a  climatic 
sense,  to  the  north  of  it. 

All  the  railroads  from  the  East,  previous  to  the  construction  of  the 
California  Southern  and  Central  lines  of  the  San:  -tern,  were 

built  with  especial  reference  to  that  portion  of  California  that  for 
thirty  years  or  more  had  been  the  only  portion  of  the  State  in  which 
any  interest  was  felt.  Up  to  within  about  a  dozen  years  ago,  Cali- 
fornia meant  that  part  which  lay  above  the  thirty-sixth  meridian. 
The  southern  portion  of  the  State  was  considered,  and  indeed  was, 
a  desert.  In  all  the  wonderful  history  of  early  California  after  it 
came  into  the  hands  of  the  Americans  it  had  no  part.  Yet  it  is  very 
old  in  the  fact  that  it  was  the  first  locality  upon  American  soil  to 
be  occupied  by  the  civilization  of  Europe.  It  has  a  story  of  its  own, 
and  a  curious  one,  apart  from  that  story  of  California  which  began 
in  1846. 

The  San  Bernardino  Mountains  are  but  an  extension  of  the  Sierra 
Madre  Range,  and  the  name  is  applied  for  local  convenience.  It  is 
the  spur  that  cuts  off  the  Mojave  rrom  the  so-called  Colorado  or- 


CALIFORNIA 


131 


Tuma  desert.  Siera  Madre  means  in  the  Spanish,  "  Mother  Range." 
The  term  "Sierra"  (Se-tf/V-rah  ; — a  saw;— toothed),  should  only  be 
.applied  to  a  succession  of  sharp  peaks.  Mr.  T.  S.  Van  Dyke,  in  his 
""Southern  California"  says  of  these  :  — 


A  Rift  in  the  Sierras. 

"Few  parts  of  the  United  States  are  less  known  and  less  traversed  than  these 
.-great  hills  ;  yet  they  look  down  upon  the  very  garden  of  California.  Away  up 
there  the  mountain  trout  flashes  undisturbed  in  the  hissing  brook,  and  the  call  of 
the  mountain  quail  rinjs  from  the  shady  glen  where  the  grizzly  bear  yet  dozes 
.away  the  day,  secure  as  in  the  olden  time.  From  the  bristling  points  where  the 


i:X'  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

lilac  and  manzinita  light  up  the  dark  hue  of  the  surrounding  chaparral,  the  deer  yet 
looks  down  upon  the  plain  from  which  the  antelopa  has  long  been  driven;  while 
on  the  lofty  ridges  that  lie  in  such  clear  outline  against  the  distant  sky  the  mountain 
sheep  still  lingers,  safe  in  its  inaccessible  home." 

This  range  then,  is  the  cause  of  the  distinctive  designation 
"Southern  California."  Practically  it  is  treated  separately  by  all 
travellers,  and  its  commercial  and  industrial  destiny  seems  to  be  also- 
different.  It  will,  at  the  proper  time,  be  considered  separately  in 
these  pages. 

California,  next  after  Texas,  is  the  largest  State  of  the  Union. 
Departing  from  the  usual  squareness  of  the  Western  States,  it  IMS  a 
curious,  broken-backed  configuration,  being  in  extreme  length  770 
miles,  in  breadth  330  miles  at  its  widest  part,  and  at  its  narrowest 
not  more  than  150  miles.  Its  area  is  about  188,981  square  miles,  or 
120,947,840  acres.  The  coast-line  is  bow-shaped,  much  indented 
with  long  curves  and  few  hays,  and  is  more  than  seven  hundred 
miles  in  length.  The  State,  by  way  of  comparison,  may  be  stated  to 
be  one-and-one-half  times  larger  than  Great  Britain  and  Ireland, 
which  contain  a  population  of  32,000,000. 

California  is  a  mountain  State,  and  it  is  estimated  that  89,000,000 
acres  are  suited  to  some  variety  of  profitable  husbandry.  It  is  the 
only  State  that  may  be  said  to  embrace  within  its  boundaries  every 
known  variety  of  climate.  Mexico  has  largely  this  quality,  with  a 
wider  area  and  greater  general  elevations  and  depressions.  The 
practical  facility  with  which  this  climatic  variety  can  be  used  is  an 
especial  Californian  feature.  Until  the  southern  part  of  the  State 
became  known  it  was  not  conceived  possible  that  any  country  could 
be  tropical  without  being  in  the  tropics,  and  could  have  every  known 
charm,  product  and  advantage,  without  a  single  one  of  the  perils. 
or  disadvantages  of  equatorial  regions.  Indeed  the  whole  State  is 
believed  by  its  oldest  inhabitants  to  be  a  country  of  contradictions 
and  curiosities,  which  must  all  be  learned  before  its  advantages  can 
be  successfully  used. 


CALIFORNIA. 


133 


The  topography  is  peculiar.  It  is,  generally  speaking,  mountain 
and  valley,  but  these  take  unique  forms.  The  reader  is  requested 
to  imagine  Califprnia  as  lying  on  the  Atlantic  instead  of  the  Pacific 
coast,  east  and  west  being  reversed  for  the  purpose.  He  would  find 
it  to  include  the  whole  shore-line  from  about  Boston  to  Charleston, 
with  all  the  area  included  in  ten  of  the  thirteen  original  States. 


There  are  two  great  mountain  ranges  which,  aside  from  the  smaller 
ranges  and  spurs,  are  its  chief  topographical  features.  One  of  these 
is  the  Sierra  Nevada  (Se-air- rah  Neh-z^^-ah; — snowy,  or  snowed^ 
Range,  and  the  other  the  Coast  Range.  The  first  has  an  altitude  of 
from  eight  to  fifteen  thousand  feet,  fencing  all  the  eastern  border. 
The  Coast  Range  is  more  like  the  mountains  we  are  accustomed  to, 


Itt  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

having  a  height  of  from  two  thousand  five  hundred  to  four  thousand 
feet.  These  hills  do  not  count  for  much  after  what  the  traveller  has 
been  accustomed  to,  and  would  pass  almost  unnoticed  but  for  the 
fact  that,  in  connection  with  the  Sierras,  they  fence  in  one  of  the  re- 
markable valleys  of  the  world. 

A  rough  diagram  of  California  would  show  a  very  much  elongated 
and  very  narrow  basin,  lying  North  and  South  nearly,  and  coming 
together  at  each  end  with  an  almost  V-shaped  point.  The  northern 
junction-point  is  marked  by  Mount  Shasta,  a  volcanic  peak  bare  and 
cold,  rising  to  an  elevation  of  nearly  fifteen  thousand  feet.  At  the 


southern  junction  of  the  two  ranges  stands  San  Bernardino  Mount- 
ain, twelve  thousand  feet  high.  To  an  inhabitant  of  the  moon  this 
conformation  may  rudely  seem  like  the  braided  chevron  on  a  lady's 

e,  with  a  gigantic  button  at  each  end. 

The  canoe-shaped  valley,  with  its  serrated  edges,  is  studded  here 
and  there  with  single  mountains,  groups,  or  spurs,  and  crossed  by 
lower  ranges.  The  cause  of  the  peculiar  climate  of  Southern  Cali- 
fornia, considered  with  reference  to  this  mountain  system  is,  that  the 
coast  range  divides,  or  forks,  about  the  north-western  corner  of  Los 
Angeles  County,  and  while  the  main,  but  lower,  range  holds  south- 


CALIFORNIA. 


135 


ward  clown  the  coast,  that  which  is  locally  known  as  the  San  Bernar- 
dino Range,  or  the  Sierra  Madre  more  generally,  turns  sharply  south- 


— . 

^JKIt.  Shast 


HIS  outline  of  the  principal  moun- 
tain systems  of  California,  leaving 
out  all  details,  shows  the  sheltered 
corner  in  which  most  that  is  improved 
of  Southern  California  lies,  also  the 
situation  of  the  great  valley  of  the 
State,  and  explains  the  reason  for  much 
that  is  peculiar  in  the  most  remarkable 
climate  of  the  world. 


?Bemardin 


eastward,  almost  eastward,  and  becomes  the  climatic  barrier  before 
referred  to.  Between  the  Coast  Range  and  the  San  Bernardinos, 
crowded  up  into  the  notch,  lies  the  San  Bernardino  Valley;  a  pocket 


136  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

as  compared  to  the  area  of  the  State,  or  even  as  compared  to  the 
whole  area  of  that  which  is  distinctively  known  as  Southern  California. 

But  the  real  valley  of  the  State; — that  which  as  to  its  northern 
half  is  known  as  the  Sacramento  Valley,  and  as  to  its  southern  half 
as  the  San  Joaquin  (H'wah-Aeen); — comprises  what  a  few  years 
ago  was  meant  by  the  word  California.  Usually,  a  river  which  trav- 
erses a  valley  flows  into  it  at  the  upper  end  and  out  of  it  at  the 
lower.  Here  it  is  not  so.  The  two  rivers,  Sacramento  and  San  Joa- 
quin, flow,  one  southward  and  the  other  northward,  practically  run 
together  half  way,  and  then  turn  westward  and  empty  into  the  Bay 
of  San  Francisco.  It  is  a  case  of  geographical  eccentricity  of  which 
California  only  seems  fully  capable. 

These  two  valleys  were  fur  a  long  time  famous  alone.  They 
were  the  agricultural  and  fruit-producing  California  of  which  so 
much  was  said  and  written.  Lateral  valleys,  nooks,  corners  and 
pockets,  shared  the  general  reputation.  They  were  famous,  and 
deservedly,  quite  to  the  exclusion  of  that  arid  southern  quarter 
which  was  perhaps  good  enough  for  the  Spaniards,  but  supposed  to 
be  good  for  nobody  else.  Enclosed  between  their  mountain  walls, 
once,  doubtless,  an  inland  sea,  they  constitute  an  immense  and  fer- 
tile area  which,  in  its  turn,  was  not  appreciated  by  the  Spaniard,  but 
in  which  the  Saxon  has  grown  rich. 

The  Sacramento  Valley  is  forty  miles  wide.  It  becomes  mountain- 
ous in  the  northern  part,  but  contains  at  least  five  million  acres  of 
fertile  land,  much  of  which  does  not  need  irrigation.  The  average 
annual  rain-fall  is  about  twenty  inches. 

And  it  is  an  error  to  suppose  that  the  climatic  peculiarities  that 
have  made  the  southern  quarter  of  the  State  so  famous  are  en- 
tirely confined  to  that  region.  All  of  California  constitutes  a 
climatic  curiosity  as  compared  to  the  East,  but  Southern  California 
is  unique  as  compared  to  the  world; — that  is  the  difference. 

In  the  very  northern  counties  of  the  State  snow  rarely  lies  on  the 
ground  more  than  one  day.  Domestic  animals  live  out  of  doors  the 


CALIFORNIA. 


137 


year  round.  There  is  frost,  but  plants  that  die  entirely  every  Winter 
in  the  East,  spring  again  from  the  roots  here  in  the  early  Spring. 
The  tenderest  varieties  of  foreign  grapes  grow. 

Until  lately  the  Sacramento  Valley  was  the  most  thickly  populated 
portion  of  the  State.    It  was  unusually  attractive;  a  great  level  over 


California  Live  Oak. 

which  as  far  as  one  can  see  are  scattered  groves  of  live-oaks,  which 
make  the  country  resemble  a  great  park.  The  foot-hills  on  its  eastern 
side  were  the  scenes  of  the  earliest  gold-digging,  and  a  population 
which  went  for  dust  remained  to  farm.  The  Sacramento  River  is- 
navigable  for  some  distance,  and  the  valley  had  a  railroad  some  years. 


138  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

earlier  than  any  other  portion  of  the  interior.  There,  between  Sacra- 
mento and  Marvsville,  lay  Suiter's  old  fort,  and  around  this,  and 
filling  all  northern  California,  lay  the  romance  of  the  gold-digging 
days; — a  romance  that  appears  one  of  the  most  attractive  in  our  an- 
nals to  every  entirely  disinterested  person,  but  which  seems  not  to 
affect  the  active  participators  in  it. 

>ut  Stockton  is  supposed  to  begin  the  southern  extension  of 
this  valley;  the  San  Joaquin.  This  end  of  it  has  an  area  of  some 
seven  million  acres,  and  stretches  from  Stockton  southward  some 
three  hundred  miles.  It  has,  not  including  thne  foot-hills,  an  average 
width  of  forty  miles.  These  foot-hills  are  among  the  best  portions 
of  the  valley  in  certain  respects.  There  are,  altogether,  about  eight- 
een million  acres  of  good  land,  ten  millions  of  which  are  considered 
susceptible  of  high  tillage. 

Both  these  valleys,  considered  together  as  the  great  California  Yal- 
.ave  an  area,  including  the  lower  hills  on  each  side,  of  about 
sixteen  thousand  square  miles.  The  greater  part  of  it  con- 
sists of  soil  washed  down  from  the  mountains  on  either  side.  It  is 
alleged  that  it  is  the  richest  large  body  of  land  in  the  United  States. 
That  statement  must  now,  however,  be  considerably  softened  and 
modified  by  the  immensely  rich  and  wide  pieces  of  "desert"  that 
have  been  taken  in  during  the  past  ten  years,  one  patch  of  which,  in 
1884,  produced  nearly  fifty  million  bushels  of  wheat.  With  the  State 
of  Kansas,  wind-swept  and  blizzard-haunted  as  she  is,  staring  one 
in  the  face,  so  to  speak,  it  is  difficult  to  prove  that  California,  or  any 
other  State,  contains  "the  richest  large  body  of  land  in  the  world." 

But  time  was,  since  the  American  occupancy,  when  this  valley  was 
considered  "good  for  nothing  but  grazing."  The  cattle-kings  had 
their  day  here  too,  and  stubbornly  resisted  the  first  feeble  encroach- 
ments of  agriculture. 

In  this  great  valley  was  tried  the  first  experiment,  by  the  Saxon, 
on  any  considerable  scale,  in  irrigation.  It  was  a  great  and  remark- 
able success  that  has  since  turned  not  only  the  region  where  first 


CALIFORNIA.  139- 

tried,  but  also  the  forsaken  sands  of  Southern  California,  into  a  vast 
garden.  In  the  past  fifteen  years  thousands  of  English-speaking 
people  have  become  permanently  prosperous  and  independent  by 
the  practice  of  an  agricultural  art  that,  twenty-five  years  ago,  was 
considered  a  Mexican  and  Pueblo  makeshift,  which  it  was  scarcely 
likely  any  but  renegade  Americans  would  ever  adopt. 


An  Unoccupied  Corner. 

In  all  California,  northern  and  Southern  alike,  the  winter  is  the 
summer-time  of  the  year.  This  question  of  Climate  is  a  very  prom- 
inent one,  and  is  often  alleged  to  be  the  principal  factor  in  all  the 
charms  of  the  country.  "  Ninety-five  per  cent,  climate,"  is  a  very 
common  allegation.  Many  people  have  been  willing  to  accept  that 
fact,  if  true,  and  to  candidly  acknowledge  the  potency  of  a  charm 
the  Spaniards  perfectly  understood  two  centuries  ago,  and  which 


140  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

they  themselves  have  only  recently  discovered.  The  idea  of  a 
reversal  of  the  seasons  is  not  perhaps  pleasant  to  the  thorough- 
going Northerner.  The  curious  thing  about  it  is  that  it  is  not  a  re- 
There  are  two  or  three  facts  that  ought  perhaps  to  be  better 
understood. 

FIRST  : — Mildness  of  temperature,  blooming  flowers,  or  the  plant- 
ing of  ordinary  Spring  crops  in  September  or  November  does  not 
mean  that  there  must  be  cold  and  frost  at  the  opposite  sea 

SECOND  : — It  does  not  mean  that,  being  warm  in  Winter,  it  must 
be  proportionately  and  unendurably  hot  in  Summer. 

It  is,  especially  in  Southern  California,  largely  an  anomalous  case, 
and  the  facts  are  these  : 

The  rains  : — there  bein^  a  distinct  rainy  season, — begin  the  last 
of  September  or  during  the  first  half  of  October.  Ploughing 
begins  about  the  firs:  ember,  and  often  la'er,  and  wheat, 

barley,   oats,  etc.,   are  -  so<»n  as  the  ground    can    be  made 

ready,  but  often  not  before   February.     The  California   farmer  has 
about  four  months  in  which  to  prepare  his  land  for  seeding. 

•;i.  where  it  is  raised  at  all,  is  planted  from  .March  to  May,  and 
need  not  be  gathered  at  any  particular  time. 

The  harvest  season  for  small  grains  is  in  the  last  part  of  May  or 
the  first  part  of  June. 

The  rains  having  ceased  in  April,  the  harvest  season  is  always  dry. 
The  grain  is  threshed  and  put  into  ba.^s,  and  left  in  the  fields,  and 
may  lie  there  at  the  convenience  of  the  owner.  California  grain 
does  not  "sweat."  Potatoes  are  often  left  in  the  ground  long 
after  they  are  matured. 

Sometimes  there  are  two  crops  raised  on  the  same  ground  in  one 
year; — wheat  or  barley  for  the  first,  and  corn  for  the  second.  Wheat 
and  barley  are  often  sown  for  hay,  and  cut  before  the  heads  fill. 
But  a  couple  of  acres  of  beets,  replanted  as  they  are  used,  will  keep 
three  or  four  milk-kine  the  year  through.  Sheep  are  never  fed  at  all. 
Horses  not  at  work  get  nothing  except  what  they  "  rustle  for  "  at 


CALIFORNIA. 


141 


14J  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

any  season.  Alfalfa  sometimes  yields  as  much  as  fifteen  tons  per 
acre  in  a  single  season,  in  from  six  to  nine  cuttings.  Horses  are 
much  more  easily  kept  in  condition  than  elsewhere.  California  is 
rapidly  becoming  the  blooded-horse  country  of  the  continent.  The 
business  of  raising  cattle  was,  for  many  long  years, — say  a  century 
and  a  quarter, — the  only  business  followed  in  California. 

It  therefore  follows  that  the  genuine,  old-fashioned  Michigan,  or 
New  York,  or  Kansas,  or  Iowa  Winter  is  absolutely  done  away  with 
and  unknown  in  all  parts  of  the  State.  The  remarks  above  are 
especially  intended  to  apply  to  that  part  now  generally  known  as 
northern  California.  So  far  as  that  part  is  concerned,  it  is  true,  in 
addition,  that  there  are  frosts  except  in  places  especially  sheltered; 
there  are  cold  winds.  The  farther  north  one  goes  the  colder  does 
it  become,  but  only  comparatively.  In  the  extreme  north  there  is 
no  Winter  in  our  sense. 

In  Southern  California  both  Winter  and  Summer  are  further 
modified  by  the  geographical  situation  mentioned  in  a  preceding 
page. 


I0UTHERN 

6ALIF0RNIA. 


|HE  reasons  for  the  peculiar  climatic  conditions  that  have 
^caused  Southern  California  to  be  set  apart  by  common 
consent,  and  considered  a  separate  country,  have  already  been 
briefly  given. 

So  great  is  the  comparative  difference  between  the  two  sections  of 
the  State,  that  there  has  been  for  some  years  a  local  rivalry.  Indeed  it 
may  almost  be  said  that  everybody,  in  California  or  out  of  it,  regards 
the  two  sections  as  entirely  distinct.  It  is  so  thought  of  and  spoken 
of.  The  distinction  has  produced  a  "boom  "  in  which  the  northern 
three-fourths  of  the  State  has  not  shared.  It  has  given  rise  to  an 
enormous  literature  and  endless  discussion,  all  with  a  climatic  ten- 
dency, and  nearly  all  included  under  the  general  head  of  advertising. 

For  it  has  been  discovered  at  last,  and  after  more  than  thirty 
"years  of  neglect,  that  all  the  advantages,  benefits  and  glories  of 
which  California-at-large  has  justly  boasted  since  1846,  exist  in 
intensified  form  in  that  neglected  corner  of  her  area  which  was  of 
all  men  considered  as  but  little  better  than  the  Yuma  and  Mojave 
13  (143) 


144 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


deserts  lying  in  suspicious  contiguity  close  beside.  Every  Californian 
of  the  old  time  who  strayed  thither  strayed  out  again.  There  was 
"  Sunshine  and  Sand."  The  soil  was  a  species  of  concrete  to  any 
judge  of  soil,  covered  with  a  merely  ornamental  and  superfluous 
layer  of  fine  sand,  that  swirled  and  shifted  with  every  wind.  A 
horrid  river-bed,  a  mere  convenience  as  an  occasional  sewer  for 
cloud-bursts,  wide  and  gray  and  dry,  and  littered  with  round 


An  Unoccupied  Nook. 

boulders,  and  treeless  and  forsaken,  was  occasionally  encountered. 
A  clump  of  willows  or  a  bunch  of  live-oaks  grew  here  and  there. 
The  brown  mountains  fenced  the  valley  round,  and  they  were  bald, 
silent,  changeless,  desolate.  There  were  almost  no  inhabitants. 
The  old  missions  were  there,  encountered  far  apart  and  falling 
into  ruin,  and  once  in  a  long  time  there  was  a  cluster  of  adobe 
houses  answering  mutely  to  some  sacred  and  sonorous  name 


SOUTHERN   CALIFORNIA.  1  tr. 

like  NUESTRA  SEXORA  REINA  DE  Los  ANGELES  ; — a  glittering  city 
now  known  as  "  Laws  Anglees," — and  SAN  CARLOS  DE  MONTEREY, 
SAN  ANTONIO  DE  PADUA,  SAN  JUAN  CAPISTRANO,  SAN  Luis 
OBISPO,  and  a  hundred  other  Sans  and  Santas,  all  flavored  with 
south-of-Europe  sacredness  and  Spanish  sonorousness  of  idea  and 
language. 

The  people  one  met  were  queer.  They  were  Spanish  peasants  ; 
ex-soldiers  stranded  in  this  far  clime  so  much  like  Madre  Espana; 
and  poor  devils  of  Pueblos.  They  held  the  country  long,  as  time 
goes  modernly,  but  it  turned  out  that  they  did  not  belong  there,  and 
could  not  stay.  As  to  how  some  of  them  went,  see  "A  Century  of 
Infamy,"  by  Mrs.  Jackson. 

There  was  sunshine,  as  mentioned,  but  no  water,  no  soil,  no  hope. 
It  is  not  definitely  discovered  as  yet,  to  whom  belongs  the  credit  of 
re-discovering  the  country;  of  seeing  with  the  eye  of  faith  that  there 
was  something  else ;  for  his  name  is  drowned  in  the  clamor  of  a 
"boom  "  to  which  all  other  booms  that  have  been  are  as  nothing. 
Kansas  City,  and  all  the  Kansas  Chicagos,  fade  into  insignificance 
when  confronted  with  a  comparison.  It  maybe  in  its  expiring  throes 
when  these  words  reach  the  public.  If  so  it  will  be  a  late  reminis- 
cence. It  is  now  in  the  present  tense. 

At  this  date  one  hears  the  buzz  all  around  him  if  he  is  there. 
The  stranger  is  impressed  with  the  idea  that  nobody  has  a  genuine 
and  unperverted  "  level  "  head.  All  one  sees  are  busily  discussing 
one  sole,  lone,  solitary,  isolated  question;  real  estate.  Lone  and 
unprotected  office-girls,  gaining  a  gruesome  crust  by  hammering  the 
unmelodious  type-writer  a  little  year  or  two  ago,  now  smile  serenely 
upon  a  world  that  has  never  been  particularly  kind  to  struggling 
females,  for  they  too  "caught  on,"  and  now  contemplate  with  chas- 
tened sweetness  a  bank-account  of  a  hundred  thousand  or  so.  Boys 
and  youngsters,  all  trades  and  occupations,  have  shared  in  the  opu- 
lent results.  Old  sea-dogs  who  had  sailed  the  wide  world  over,and  who, 
.-sailor-like,  were  previously  content,  have  anchored  to  these  rocky 


146 


OVERLAND   GUIDE. 


hills,  and  will  sail  no  more.  Smart  young  men  from  the  slow  old 
towns  and  States  where  booms  are  never  known,  and  where  the 
citizens  however  worthy  and  pious  do  but  vegetate,  find  full  scope 
here  for  a  financial  genius  hitherto  unsuspected  save  by  themselves. 
All  are  talkers  upon  one  eloquent  theme  ;  there  are  no  conservatives- 
and  silent  men.  The  idea  that  the  word  "  value  "  retains  any  of  its 
original  significance  is  discarded.  It  is  all  "will  be."  There  is 
practically  no  present,  and  yet  to  this  golden  present  there 


>: 

Old  California  Hacienda* 

is  to  be  no  end.  It  is  the  curious  spectacle  of  a  country 
originally  rocky,  sandy,  silent,  useless,  wearing  only  the  pe- 
culiar charm  all  sterile  countries  seem  to  wear,  suddenly  acquir- 
ing a  value  as  though  in  the  core  of  each  of  its  oranges  there 
was  hidden  a  grain  of  gold  ;  as  if  every  acre  had  suddenly  ceased  to- 
be  merely  soil,  and  was  become  a  new  commodity  in  the  markets  and 
desires  of  men.  There  is  an  idea  more  or  less  clearly  defined  that 
every  person  in  the  wide  expanse  of  the  Union  outside  of  California 
is  an  invalid,  and  must  come  here.  There  is  nowhere  else  to  go. 


SOUTHERN   CALIFORNIA.  147 

Perhaps  old  Palestine  was  such  a  land  as  this  when  the  spies  car- 
ried back  that  somewhat  hypothetical  bunch  of  grapes,  but  if  it  ever 
was  the  day  has  passed.  Italy  is  not  such,  or  Spain,  with  all  its 
olive-orchards  which  to  the  mind  of  Padre  Junipero  Serra  were 
doubtless  typical  of  those  he  and  his  brethren'  planted  here.  For 
these  glowing  Summer  days  there  is  no  change  during  all  the  long 
year.  In  Winter, — the  Winter  we  fear  and  dread — the  rains  come, 
and  dusty  nature  bathes  her  face  and  blooms  again.  The  tender 
roses  we  nurse  and  watch,  here  climb  the  roof-tree  in  January.  The 
beautiful  foliage  of  Japan  rejoices  in  its  exile,  and  makes  the  yellow 
road  like  an  avenue  in  Jerusalem  the  Glorious.  So  tickled  was  the 
concrete  soil  with  the  first  drink  brought  it  by  the  contriving  Yankee 
out  of  an  iron  pipe,  that  it  has  not  since  ceased  to  laugh.  Gerani- 
ums, verbenas,  and  such  weeds,  become  trees.  Plebeian  tomato- 
vines  live  and  spread  and  bear  from  year  to  year.  Oranges,  side- 
by-side  with  the  fruits  that  everybody's  boyhood  knows,  are  expected; 
nobody  notices  them,  though  every  tree  bears  three  or  four  times  as 
much  as  such  trees  do  m  their  natural  homes  in  the  tropics.  All  the 
vast  kindred  of  luxuries  patiently  waited  for  and  thankfully  received 
once  in  a  while  in  other  States  are  here  a  matter  of  course.  We 
raise  grapes,  for  instance.  Certainly;  so  does  God  raise  them  in  the 
woods  for  the  birds  and  foxes,  and  both  are  about  of  a  kind  when 
one  comes  to  compare  them  with  such  as  grow  here  on  every  vine, 
that  lie  in  the  dust  ungathered  for  over-plentifulness. 

Yet  the  climate  that  is  luxurious  in  Winter  does  not  grow  oppress- 
ive in  Summer.  Of  all  dog-day  resorts  this  is  probably  the  best. 
It  is  not  believed;  the  reader  will  not  believe  it;  but  it  is  true.  You 
may  walk  in  the  sun,  or  sit  in  it,  in  June  or  January.  It  is  true  that 
within  a  very  limited  area  one  spot  may  be  much  hotter  than 
another;  one  side  of  a  row  of  hills  may  have  at  seasons  a  different 
climate  from  the  other  side.  A  change  very  perceptible  to  a  con- 
firmed invalid  may  be  had  by  going  a  few  miles  in  the  same  vicinity; 
but  the  general  statement  is  true.  You  wear  the  same  clothes  the 


148 


OVERLAND  GUIDE 


year  round.  Every  night  you  sleep  under  a  blanket  You  may 
calculate  with  certainty  upon  what,  save  a  woman's  mood,  is  known 
to  be  the  most  uncertain  of  earthly  things; — the  weather. 

It  is  the  south-western  corner  of  the  American  world,     Beyond 
the  rim  of  mountains  that  fence  it  on   the  East  and  North  lie  the 


Original  Inhabitants  of  the  Sacramento  VtHey 

voiceless  stretches  of  rock  and  sand;  grown  sparsely  with  yucca 
palms  and  all  the  stunted  family  of  gnarled  and  warty  vegetation 
and  strewn  with  volcanic  scoria;  which  you  have  crossed.  Through 
the  notches  in  its  western  rim  is  seen  the  shining  sea.  Below  it  lies 
the  peninsula  of  Lower  California.  But  the  electric  light  is  glinting. 


SOUTHERN7   CALIFORNIA  149 

over  leagues  of  what  to  the  Pueblo,  the  Spaniard,  and  the  early 
Californian  alike,  was  simply  yellow  desert.  In  a  brief  time  the 
leaves  of  palms  and  cypresses  will  meet  across  miles  of  stately 
avenue,  and  the  white  towers  of  its  cities  will  shine  through  morn- 
ing mists  like  Beulah  from  afar.  Fenced  in  by  distance,  desert 
and  sea,  unknown  while  the  Republic  grew  to  fifty  millions  of 
people,  it  was  its  unguessed  destiny  to  burst  at  last  upon  the 
traveller  from  the  windows  of  a  palace-car.  When  he  has  seen  it 
all;  when  his  mixed  sensations  have  settled  down  to  certain  con- 
clusions; when  he  is  tired  alike  of  its  oratory  and  its  sweets;  when 
he  has  learned  the  alchemy  that  transmutes  sand  into  soil  and  yellow 
and  forbidding  nakedness  into  the  verdure  of  Eden;  he  may  as  he 
again  turns  eastward  almost  wonder  where  now  is  the  Angel  with  the 
Flaming  Sword  who  by  all  authentic  accounts  had  orders  to  stand 
at  the  southern  end  of  Cajon  Pass; — that  is  to  say,  at  the  gate  of 
the  lost  paradise. 

AVhatever  history  California  has,  began,  and  most  of  it  was  en- 
acted, south  of  the  Sierra  Madre  Range,  and  a  review  of  it  is  merely 
a  glimpse  of  those  sleepy  years  when  all  the  life  of  the  country  was 
as  much  as  possible  like  that  of  .Spain,  and  under  a  climate  so  much 
like  that  of  Spain  that  these  Latins  loved  it  and  fought  for  it  to  the 
best  of  their  resources  and  valor. 

To  begin  at  the  beginning,  the  Bay  of  San  Diego  was  discovered 
in  the  month  of  September,  1542,  (December  2ist,  1620,  being  the 
date  of  the  landing  of  the  Pilgrims)  by  a  Portuguese  in  the  service 
of  Spain  named  Cabrillo  (Cabree/yo: — little  goat;  Kid).  He  was  a 
wandering  mariner  in  a  new  world,  sailing  unknown  seas  in  the  em- 
ploy of  the  then  greatest  maritime  power  of  any  age.  The  object 
was  not  geographical  or  scientific  investigation,  but  simple,  harmless 
conquest.  He  happened  upon  this  finest  harbor  but  one  on  the 
Pacific  coast, — but  no  result  followed.  He  merely  sailed  out  again, 
and  the  important  find  was  almost  forgotten  for  more  than  fifty 
years. 


160 


OVERLAND   GUIDE. 


During  this  interval  one  Sir  Francis  Drake,  wandering  abroad  like 
the  Little  Goat,  discovered  the  place,  and  had  the  audacity  to  name  it, 
and  all  the  adjoining  country,  NEW  ALBION.  This  is  the  first  name 
by  which  California  was  known  to  those  by  whom,  after  so  long  a 
time,  it  was  to  be  owned  and  extolled  and  speculated  in.  As  for 
Drake,  all  English-speaking  people  have  been  trained  to  regard  him 


Beach  at  San  Diego. 

as  a  great  navigator,  ranking  with  Frobisher  and  Cook.  But  he  was 
not;  he  was  a  "pirate."  That  is  what  the  Spanish  historians  dis- 
tinctly call  him,  and  his  exploit  in  taking  in  the  Bay  of  San  Diego 
when  he  did  not  know  anybody  had  been  there  before  him,  so 
angered  Felipe  II,  when  he  heard  of  it,  that  he  ordered  the  place 
"fortified." 

So  a  man  named  Vizciano  (a  nickname  for  a  man  who  hails  from 


SOUTHERN   CALIFORNIA.  151 

the  Spanish  province  of  Biscay; — aBis-ke-#//-no)  came  here  November 
loth,  1602,  for  that  purpose.  This  was  the  first  step  taken  to  actually 
occupy  the  country  by  white  men  and  Europeans.  The  place  was 
named  SAN  DIEGO.  For  it  must,  complying  with  the  pious  customs 
of  the  Spaniards,  be  San  or  Santa  something.  The  name  is  the 
same  with  St.  James,  or  James  (Santiago)  who  is  the  patron  saint  of 
old  Spain,  and  whose  name  has  for  hundreds  of  years  been  the 
Spanish  war-cry.  His  "day  "  is  the  i2th  of  November;  the  day  of 
the  survey  of  the  Bay  by  Vizciano;  and  this  is  why  the  place  remains 
for  all  time  not  New  Albion,  but  San  Diego.  As  the  name  is  likely 
to  be  a  frequent  one  in  all  Southern  California  reminiscences,  it  is 
well  enough  to  remember  that  it  is  not  pronounced  "  Dee-#tt'-go,"  but 
Dee-0-go,  with  the  "a," — Spanish  "e" — as  broad  as  one  can  get  it. 
The  name  of  this  holy  man  is  often  on  the  lips  of  Spaniards, 
especially  sailors  in  foreign  parts.  That  is  why  they  are  universally 
nicknamed  "  Dagos,"  meaning  "  Diegos  "; — Jameses.  It  is  a  subject 
of  appropriate  mention  here  because  there  are  dozens  of  euphonious 
Spanish  names  in  California,  both  the  meaning  and  pronunciation  of 
which  are  disregarded  equally  with  this. 

From  this  i2th  of  November,  1602,  that  which  is  now  known  as 
Southern  California  was  called  "Aha  "  California; — an  almost  pre- 
cisely opposite  designation  to  the  present  one,  given  in  distinction 
to  the  Peninsula,  now,  as  then,  called  "  Lower "  California.  The 
Spaniards  of  those  times  knew  little  or  nothing  of  what  we  call  Cali- 
fornia. It  seems  from  later  events  that  they  were  very  ignorant  of 
its  resources  when  they  lost  it,  two  hundred  and  forty-four  years 
later.  But  what  they  considered  to  be  theirs  was  without  boundary 
or  limit  in  any  direction.  As  usual,  they  did  not  know  what  they 
had,  either  commercially  or  geographically. 

Events  moved  so  very  slowly  in  those  days  that  it  was  not  until 
July  ist,  1769,  a  date  which  brings  us  very  near  to  the  beginning  of 
our  Revolutionary  war  and  something  to  date  from,  that  the  actual 
occupation  of  the  Pacific  coast  by  Europeans  began.  Then  one  of 


168 


OVERLAND   GUIDE. 


the  most  remarkable  men  of  those  times,  a  Franciscan  friar  named 
Junipero  Serra,  (Hu-«^<r/-a-ro  Ser-ra^)  with  his  companions,  came 
to  San  Diego  to  establish  a  mission.  It  is  so  very  easy  to  say  they 
came,  and  so  easy  to  do  it  now,  that  it  is  difficult  to  appreciate  the 
fact  that  they  had  a  terrible  time  of  it,  and  that  some  who  started 
never  reached  the  place  at  all.  The  soldier  and  the  priest  came 


Unconverted   Aborigines  of  Southern   California. 

together,  as  usual,  and  the  conquest  was  one  of  Church  and  State 
combined.  They  camped  on  this  desolate  shore  to  create  a  peculiar 
history,  and  leave  results  that  have  not  yet  departed.  San  Diego 
was  the  spot  where  civilization  began,  and  the  place  has  also  the 
honor  of  being  the  initial  point  of  the  second  and  more  wonderful 
civilization  which  was  to  follow,  when  in  1846  Commodore  Stockton 


SOUTHERN   CALIFORNIA. 


153 


entered  the  harbor  with  the  frigate  Constitution,  and  proceeded  to 
occupy  the  antique  earthwork  above  the  Old  Town  of  San  Diego, 
which  has  since  then  been  known  as  Fort  Stockton. 

The  story  of  early  California  is  a  religious  history.     It  begins  and 
ends  with  the  history  of  missions.     The  mission  of  San  Diego  was. 


the  mother  of  all  the  rest.  Fifty  years  after  the  establishment  of 
this  there  were  twenty  others  scattered  along  the  coast  as  far  North 
as  San  Francisco.  Though  in  many  cases  they  were  fifty  miles 
apart,  their  boundaries  joined.  They  occupied  the  land.  In  1825,. 
when  the  Spanish  rule  had  departed  from  Mexico  and  they  had 
begun  to  rapidly  decay,  they  still  owned  1,200,000  head  of  cattle^ 


154  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

more  than  100,000  horses,  15,000  mules,  100,000  sheep,  and  innu- 
merable swine.  They  had  not  less  than  a  million  dollars  in  dust, 
bullion  and  coin,  not  to  mention  treasures  in  the  form  of  gold  and 
silver  statues,  crucifixes,  and  other  church  property.  They  had 
established  a  foreign  trade,  and  did  a  lucrative  business  in  hides, 
h  jrns,  tallow,  etc.  It  was  then,  and  would  be  now  but  for  the  fact 
that  the  land  has  grown  too  valuable,  the  finest  cattle  country  of 
which  there  is  any  knowledge.  About  1820  this  religio-commercial 
arrangement  had  grown  to  be  the  most  remarkable  missionary 
scheme  the  world  has  seen.  The  beginnings  had  been  honest 
enough,  entered  into  in  peril  and  carried  out  in  good  faith.  In  the 
end,  and  long  before  the  end,  the  enterprise  had  degenerated  into  a 
money-making  scheme,  backed  by  plain,  simple,  undisguised  slavery. 
There  were  twenty  thousand  "Christianized  "  Indians  in  and  about 
irious  missions.  Every  one  was  an  agricultural  slave,  held  and 
worked  as  such  for  pecuniary  profit.  When  unwilling  they  were 
flogged,  confined,  starved  or  tortured.  Besides  these  miserable 
creatures  there  were  at  least  a  hundred  thousand  still  wild  and 
unconverted  ones,  to  whose  spiritual  welfare  nobody  paid  the 
slightest  attention.  "Ranching"  had  become  the  business,  with  a 
droning  accompaniment  of  religious  services.  The  civil  officers,  the 
alcaldes  and  commandantes,  were  partners  with  the  Church  in  this 
business.  During  the  lapse  of  a  half-century  or  more,  the  Spaniards 
who  owned  Southern  California  had  every  inducement  to  become  the 
idlest,  proudest,  most  independent  and  wealthy  provincials  on  the 
continent. 

And  they  seem  to  have  improved  the  opportunity.  You  may  see 
the  remains  of  it  wherever  you  encounter  a  son  of  the  soil.  Con- 
versation with  the  elders  of  them  always  elicits  a  vain  regret  that 
the  old  times  did  not  stay.  The  change,  when  it  came,  ought  to 
have  made  a  millionaire  of  every  holder  of  a  grant,  for  it  trans- 
formed an  unknown  and  almost  worthless  Mexican  province  into  one 
of  the  great  States  of  the  Union,  but  it  did  not  have  that  effect. 


'l.->«  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

These  first  families  often  have  a  bearing  that  makes  you  privately 
smile,  for  they  retain  amid  all  the  changes  and  after  so  long  a  time, 
almost  all  of  the  traditional  Spanish  moods,  gaits,  hauteurs  and 
arrogances.  Sometimes,  though  not  often,  there  has  evidently 
been  an  admixture  of  Indian  blood.  Nearly  all  that  are  left  are 
strong  reminders  of  the  happy  times  when  no  Spaniard  in  California 
ever  actually  worked,  no  matter  how  poor  ;  when  the  Christianized 
Indians  were  his  own  in  the  name  of  piety  ;  when  he  owned  all  the 
surroundings  of  a  narrow  and  provincial  magnificence.  An  aristoc- 
racy had  grown  up  here  the  patent  to  which  consisted  only  in  being 
a  native  of  California.  They  had  wealth  galore.  Their  beautiful 
women  grew  up  sprightly,  frivolous  and  pious,  precisely  like  their 
great-great-grandmothers  in  old  Spain  ;  only  incomparably  richer. 

They  imagined  they  had  all  this  sunny  world  to  themselves,  and 
were  born  and  died  in  it,  secure  and  content.  They  had  practically 
forgotten  Spain,  caring  no  more  about  it  than  we  do  about  England 
•or  Germany.  They  called  themselvt  ins  only  because  it  was 

necessary  to  be  something,  and  they  cared  very  little  for  that  far- 
away power,  or  for  any  other.  They  did  not  dream  of  the  destiny, 
or  want  of  destiny,  in  store  for  them  at  the  hands  of  a  republic  of 
whose  existence  they  onlv  knew  from  "around  the  Horn." 

The  change  came  suddenly.  From  August  6th,  1846,10  December 
2d,  of  the  same  year,  had  been  passed  by  a  squad  of  men  who  were 
considered  "The  Army  of  the  West,"  in  marching  from  the  banks 
of  the  Missouri  to  a  pass  on  what  is  now  known  as  Warner's  Ranch 
in  San  Diego  County.  They  were  met  there  on  December  6th,  by 
the  Mexican  force,  and  the  bloody  little  battle  of  San  Pascual  (Pas- 
•qual)  was  fought.  It  was  a  victory  for  the  "  invaders,"  but  it  cost 
the  lives  of  nineteen  officers  and  men,  only  two  of  whom  were  killed 
by  bullets,  the  remainder  being  the  victims  of  the  characteristic 
Spanish  "cold  steel."  If  there  is  not  a  national  cemetery  in  this  re- 
mote corner  of  our  dominion  it  would  seem  that  there  should  be. 

The  little  command  continued  its  march  to  San  Diego  and  a  June- 


SOUTHERN   CALIFORNIA. 


157 


tion  with  Stockton,  and  "  Alta  California"  was  practically  gone  from 
the  Spaniard  forever. 

But  already  in  1845  five  thousand  Americans  had  crossed  the 
plains  into  California,  having  made  a  journey  a  good  deal  longer  and 
harder  than  any  mentioned  in  these  pages.  It  will  be  recalled  that 
Captain  Donner  and  his  party  perished  in  a  snow-storm  in  1846. 
Then  the  romance  and  the  tragedy  of  California  began.  After  the 
episode  of  Sutter's  Mill  the  country  filled  very  rapidly.  But  the  im- 


Improved. 

migration  tended  northward  entirely,  and  the  growth  of  the  State 
was  mainly  there  for  thirty-five  years.  A  few  years  ago  the  results 
of  agricultural  and  irrigation  experiments  began  to  demonstrate  the 
wisdom  of  the  Spaniard's  choice.  Southern  California  has  of  late 
years  attracted  more  attention  than  any  other  country  of  equal  size 
has  ever  done. 

Southern  California,  solely  considered,  has  been  so  much  talked  of 
•and  written  about  that  the  idea  that  it  is  a  geographical  and  munici- 


(153) 


SOUTHERN   CALIFORNIA.  159 

pal  subdivision  of  the  State  would  be  a  perfectly  natural  one.  But  it 
has  no  specific  boundaries.  The  name  is  a  purely  local  one.  It  is 
supposed  to  be  composed  of  the  counties  of  Santa  Barbara,  Ventura, 
Los  Angeles,  part  of  the  huge  county  of  San  Bernardino,  and  all  of 
the  equally  huge  San  Diego.  That  is,  run  a  line  East  from  the 
northern  boundary  of  Santa  Barbara  County,  and  all  South  of  it  is, 
by  common  consent,  Southern  California. 

A  glance  at  the  map  will  show  that  this  is  but  a  small  portion 
of  the  territory  included  within  the  boundaries  of  this  great  State. 
It  is  outside  of  the  great  valleys ;  it  is  fenced  off  ;  it  is  but  a 
pocket, — a  corner.  Yet  this  "  small  "  territory  contains  nearly  ninety 
thousand  square  miles.  The  irregular  square  comprising  Massachu- 
setts, Rhode  Island  and  Connecticut  would  be  less  than  one-fourth 
of  it.  Los  Angeles  County;  a  very  small  one  for  California;  is  two- 
thirds  as  large  as  Massachusetts,  while  San  Diego  County  is  rivalled 
only  by  Yavapai,  in  Arizona,  and  is  considerably  larger  than  an  aver- 
age State. 

Another  curious  fact  is  that  only  an  infinitesimal  corner  of 
this  corner  has  given  the  country  its  world-wide  reputation.  The 
little  nook  where  the  Coast  Range  divides  and  runs  off  eastward, 
while  another,  and  lower  range,  continues  its  southern  direction,  is 
the  centre  of  richness  and  celebrity.  Everybody  has  heard  of  the 
San  Gabriel  Valley,  yet  it  is  only  about  twenty  miles  long  and  ten 
miles  wide.  The  whole  San  Bernandino  Valley,  lying  south  of  the 
range  of  that  name,  extends  only  from  San  Bernardino  to 
Los  Angeles,  but  it  is  a  present  or  prospective  garden  from  end 
to  end. 

It  is  necessary  to  take  what  is  called  a  "  bird's-eye  "  view  of  the 
country.  If  a  miniature  cast  were  taken  of  Southern  California,  as 
has  been  done  of  Switzerland,  looked  down  upon  it  would  casually 
appear  to  be  nothing  but  mountain  ranges,  spurs,  and  hills.  But, 
closely  inspected,  there  could  be  seen  some  small  valleys  nestled  in 

between.     Therein  lies  the  secret.     These  valleys  ;  mere  nooks  of  a 
11 


160 


OVERLAND   GUIDE. 


mountain  world  ;  of  all  shapes  and  dimensions;  unimportant  as  to 
size  when  compared  with  the  country  but  big  enough  of  themselves, 
and  each  one  an  Eden  of  fertility  ;  have  given  Southern  California 
the  fame  no  other  region  ever  had. 

Out  to  the  south-eastward  of  Los  Angeles  stretches  the  Colorado 
Desert.  It  occupies,  with  other  and  smaller  patches  of  the  same 
desert  under  different  names,  the  greater  portion  of  the  country.  It 
is  just  like  what  the  wayfarer  has  recently  crossed  between  The 


Mountain  Glimpse 

Needles  and  Barstow.  It  grows  even  more  hideous  in  the  south- 
eastern part  of  San  Bernardino  County; — on  down  to  old  Fort  Yuma 
on  the  Colorado.  There  are  places  there  where  the  climate  seems 
unmitigated  by  a  single  redeeming  circumstance.  One  spot*  is 


*  On  Tuesday  last,  the  men  employed  by  the  Southern  Pacific  Company,  three  miles  east 
of  Indio  struck  a  steady  flow  of  pure  water  at  540  feet  depth.  The  present  flow  is  about 
10,000  gallons  per  hour,  but  the  engineer  in  charge  expects  to  obtain  a  flow  of  at  least  sW,000 
gallons,  when  the  pipe  is  cleared  of  clay  and  gravel.  \V<  >rk  has  been  going  on  for  the  past 
six  weeks  on  this  well,  the  success  of  which  will  undoubtedly  result  in  many  more  being 
N>red.— Ariz< 


SOUTHERN   CALIFORNIA.  161 

three  or  four  hundred  feet  lower  than  the  adjacent  sea,  and  is  a  kind 
of  geographical  Hades  all  the  year.  Always  in  sight,  from  every 
elevation,  are  the  glowing  edges  of  some  desert  stretch  where  man 
has  not  dreamed  of  residence  or  toil. 

We  will  venture  the  statement  that  the  desert  is  in  nature  precisely 
like  the  rest.  It  does  not  seem  so  now,  but  it  was  so  not  many  years 
ago,  when  all  the  now  lovely  valleys  were  sun-baked  ovens  no  one 
had  thought  of  occupying. 

The  eastern  man  who  is  on  his  way  to  California  should  remember 
that  he  is  about  to  witness  something  to  which  he  has  heretofore 
been  an  entire  stranger.  The  remotest  traditions  of  the  Saxon  race 
have  left  it  out.  It  is  the  making  and  occupying  of  a  new  country 
without  natural  resources  except  as  to  climate,  by  entirely  artificial 
helps.  It  is  a  scheme  of  geographical  Redemption.  Water  is  the 
transforming  power.  None  of  this  wonderful  country  ;  hardly  an 
acre  beyond  the  occupations  of  the  original  Spaniards  ;  could  be 
occupied  now  save  for  the  skillful  bringing  of  water  where  it  never 
was  before. 

If  you  should  go  into  any  nook  of  the  Colorado  Desert,  and  get 
water  there  by  boring  or  ditching,  you  will  find  the  apparently  sterile 
soil  the  richest  in  the  world.  If  there  is  water  enough,  an  Eden 
will  grow  green  there  also.  In  time  to  come  there  will  be  oases 
there,  and  it  will  be  no  more  strange,  no  more  curious  to  the  visitor's 
eye,  than  it  is  now  to  see  the  mysterious  streams  and  flowing  wells 
that  are  a  feature  of  the  redeemed  portion. 

There  was,  under  the  Spanish  occupancy,  a  little  water.  There 
were  "  rivers,"  such  as  they  were,  as  the  Los  Angeles,  the  San  Gabriel, 
the  Santa  Ana.  In  an  eastern  sense  they  were  ridiculous.  They 
did  not  flow  between  defined  banks;  for  a  good  part  of  the  year  per- 
haps, they  did  not  flow  at  all.  They  had  a  way  of  dodging  under  the 
ground  for  miles  at  a  time.  Their  wide  beds  were  marked  by  gray 
sand  and  round  boulders.  There  merely  seemed  to  have  once  been 
a  river  there, — perhaps.  At  other  places  their  current  gently  flowed, 


162  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

and  at  these  localities  the  Mission  fathers  and  the  Spaniards  made 
their  improvements.  But  Spanish  irrigation  was  wasteful  and  neg- 
ligent of  what  little  water  they  had.  When  the  Yankee  concluded 
to  come  he  took  measures  to  conduct  the  streams  in  cement-lined 
ditches  and  through  pipes.  Then  he  began  to  bore.  Not  content 
with  a  perpendicular  hole,  some  of  his  Artesian  exploits  are  hori- 
zontal. Boring  into  the  side  of  a  mountain,  he  coaxes  the  stream 
that  has  sunk  there  out  to  him  by  gravity.  The  expedient  occurred 
to  him  of  damming  the  ends  of  mountain  canyons,  and  making  a 
reservoir.  All  his  experiments  have  been  successful.  Indeed  the 
story  of  the  country  is  a  romance  of  unlooked-for  successes.  There 
is  much  more  water  than  the  first  settlers  dreamed  there  was,  and  it 
requires  less  to  make  the  country  fruitful  than  the  Spaniards 
thought. 

Thus,  there  is  likely  to  be  a  surprising  awakening  for  any  eastern 
traveller  who  conies  to  S  mthern  California  with  only  the  flowery 
side  of  the  country  uppermost  in  his  drear.is.  There  are  no  level, 
black  acres  of  government  land  awaiting  the  plow;  there  are  no  roll- 
ing green  prairies.  Seen  as  it  lies,  and  compared  by  sight  alone 
with  such  countries  as  Illinois  -  r  .Misuari  or  Kansas,  the  region  is 
miserably  poor.  More  than  half  of  it  is  irredeemable  after  water 
has  done  all  that  it  can  do.  Barren  places  abound  in  the  richest 
parts.  Patches  pitilessly  desolate  lie  beside  gardens.  The  country 
can  never  become  either  in  appearance  or  reality  a  vast  vegetable 
garden.  The  charm  of  variety  will  still  remain,  no  matter  what 
improvements  are  made. 

This  is  fortunate  from  a  view  which  is  undoubtedly  the  practical 
one.  The  country  owes  its  fame  and  its  unprecedented  "boom"  to 
the  facilities  it  offers  for  the  enjoymnit  of  life.  Both  in  climate  and 
scenery  there  is  little  left  to  be  desired.  The  struggle  with  the 
alternations  of  intense  heat  and  bitter  cold,  and  deep  mud  and  wet 
seasons,  and  coughs  and  general  discomfort,  is  forever  over  here. 
Wherever  there  is  a  valley  where  water  has  come  the  productiveness 


Moun  am  <nd  Valley. 

(163) 


1M  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

is  enormous.  No  one  who  has  not  seen  it  can  have  any  conception- 
of  both  the  luxuriance  and  the  quality  this  disintegrated  granite 
"soil"  brings  forth.  It  cannot  be  judged  by  the  eye.  Some  of  it 
that  appears  to  be  almost  pure  sand,  or  even  mica,  is  surprisingly 
rich.  It  requires  only  two  conditions  to  make  almost  the  worst  of 
it  more  productive  than  the  loam  of  primeval  woods ;  moisture  and 
warmth.  The  last  it  always  has;  the  first  comes  by  skill  and  the 
expenditure  of  capital. 

The  appearance  of  the  country  as  nature  left  it  may  suggest  to- 
the  reader  none  of  its  capacities.  Everything  now  is  an  exotic. 
Everything  from  everywhere  will  grow.  This  is  what  the  country 
was,  as  described  by  Mr.  Van  Dyke,  before  the  modern  miracles  had 
been  worked.  He  alludes,  of  course,  to  the  country  as  it  was  then 
habitable;  not  to  the  desert. 

"  Within  this  enclosure  of  desert,  mountain,  and  ocean  lies  a  tract  that  has  not 
its  like  upon  the  globe.  One  sees  valleys  of  the  brightest  verdure  where  the  grass 
is  fed  by  the  drainage  of  the  surrounding  hills,  and  ot  .  -  j^rccn  with  the 

dense  foliage  of  live  oaks  that  have  stood  shoulder  to  shoulder  for  ages.  *  * 
Here  a  canyon  enters  the  plain  with  a  great  wash  from  some  ancient  cloud  burst  or 
season  of  unusual  rain,  cutting  the  level  with  a  long  deep  gully,  and  then  covering 
it  with  acres  of  boulders  and  gravel;  and  here  another  enters  by  a  little  soft  valley, 
clad  in  a  rich  brown  carpet  of  dried  clover  and  flowers,  with  perhaps  a  huge  rock- 
pile  of  ancient  granite  in  its  centre  overshadowed  by  the  sweeping  arms  of  some 
venerable  live-oak.  There  lies  the  great  plain  itself,  with  the  distant  laguna  glitter- 
ing on  its  breast,  with  tall  slender  columns  of  dust  marching  slowly  over  its  face 
where  the  little  whirlwinds  move  along;  the  Indian  girls,  bright  with  gay  calico,  jog- 
ging on  their  little  ponies.  *  *  *  Upon  a  rising  knoll  shine  the  white 
walls  of  the  old  Spanish  ranch-house,  with  saddled  horses  tied  to  the  porch,  beneath, 
which  the  owner  and  his  friends  are  perhaps  rolling  cigarettes  and  chattering  melo- 
dious Spanish,  while  the  herdsmen  are  driving  the  herds  without. 

"You  see  the  line  of  the  water  course,  now  perhaps  only  a  long  dry  bed  of  white 
sand,  winding  seaward  through  long  green  lines  of  sycimore,  cottonwood,  and 
willow,  spreading  out  at  times  into  broad  groves.  Perhaps  the  water  breaks  out 
here  and  there  in  a  long  shining  strip,  or  it  may  flow  on  for  miles  and  then  sink 
to  rise  no  more.  *  *  * 


SOUTHERN   CALIFORNIA.  165 

"Along  the  edges  the  plains  and  valleys  Lreak  into  low  hills  covered  with 
thin  grayish-green  brush,  and  the  little  hollows  between  them  are  often  filled  with 
prickly-pear,  or  the  still  more  forbidding  cholla  cactus,  as  high  as  one's  head.  And 
often  these  low  hills  are  themselves  hard  and  stony,  and  covered  with  cactus,  and 
often  are  only  concretions  of  cobble-stones,  with  which  the  intervening  hollows  are 
also  filled.  *  *  *  These  hills  break  into  higher  ones  that  roll  in  all  sorts  of 
shapes  and  bristle  with  dense,  dark  brush  higher  than  one's  head,  or  perhaps  are 
covered  with  dead  grass  and  scattered  green  bushes  of  live-oak,  sumac  and  fuchsia. 
Among  these  bushes  smooth  boulders  of  granite  often  shine  afar  like  springs  on 
the  hill-side,  or  they  stand  along  the  crests  looking  against  the  sky  like  houses  or 
chimneys.  Again  some  of  these  hills  are  only  huge  undulations  of  bare  dirt, 
reaching  for  miles  like  chopping  waves  upon  a  stormy  sea,  some  gray,  some 
dingy  white,  others  a  sickly  brown  or  red. 

"  Beyond  these  secondary  hills  rise  others,  thousands  of  feet  high,  covered  with 
dark-green  chaparral,  through  which  perhaps  a  clump  of  dark-green  sycamores 
marks  the  presence  of  water.  Or  they  may  be  from  base  to  summit  studded  with 
boulders,  amid  which  the  lilac,  manzanita,  and  live-oak  struggle  for  foothold. 
Others  again  have  long,  smooth  slopes,  golden  with  dead  fox-tail  grass,  over  which 
venerable  live-oaks  stand  scattered.  And  among  the  fostering  shoulders  of  these 
lower  mountains  are  often  little  gardens  of  living  green,  some. imes  sunk  like 
lakes  into  their  very  tops.  Between  the  ranges  of  such  hills  may  lie  broad  valleys 
or  wide  table-lands,  with  surfaces  like  rolling  prairie,  all  lifted  into  the  region  of 
abundant  rains.  And  far  above  all  else  rise  fir-plumed  mountains,  whose  sides 
are  robed  in  dark  forests,  below  whose  heads  the  clouds  float  in  long  streams, 
whose  highest  gulches  are  white  with  snow  far  into  the  summer,  while  in  winter 
it  often  lies  twenty  feet  deep,  though  the  orange  tree  is  blooming  scarce  twenty 
miles  away." 

This  brief  and  comprehensive  picture  embodies  much  of  the  charm 
of  the  country,  and  is  at  least  suggestive  of  the  fact  that  the  region 
is  unique  in  appearance  as  it  is  in  climate  and  products.  The  author 
adds  a  contrasting  picture.  He  says: 

"Such  was  the  view  of  the  land  a  few  years  ago;  but  now  valley,  slope,  and 
mesa,  and  even  the  mountain-sides,  are  dotted  with  bright  and  beautiful  homes, 
while  villages  and  even  cities  are  rearing  tall  spires  from  the  lately  bare  plains. 
*  *  *  Hundreds  upon  hundreds  of  handsome  houses,  embowered  in  every 
variety  of  shrubbery,  now  rise  amid  orange  arid  lemon  groves,  fields  of  alfalfa, 


166 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


orchards  where  the  foliage  of  the  apricot,  prune,  plum,  walnut,  almond,  peach,  or 
pear  hide  the  ground  beneath,  vineyards  where  over  sixty  kinds  of  grapes  are 
growing,  and  the  plats  of  raisin-grapes  alone  are  larger  than  many  wheat-fields  of 
the  Middle  States." 

These  pictures  might  be  made  indefinitely  by  any  visitor  who  had 
the  love  of  nature  to  understand  them  and  the  skill  to  describe  them. 
But  only  actual  presence  can  give  the  actual  and  almost  indescrib- 
able charm.  And  the  growth,  the  changes,  the  unparalleled  im- 
provement, is  not  embroidery.  It  was  done  for  money,  and  it  brings 
money.  The  country  is  not  one  for  the  pioneer;  it  is  rather  the 
land  of  the  millionaire.  No  man  of  quite  moderate  means  has  any 
call  to  California  for  an  improvement  of  his  fortunes.  The  "  day 
of  small  things"  has  passed.  It  is  rapidly  becoming  the  most 
o'pulent  region  under  the  American  Flag.  Its  acres  are  purchased 
as  a  luxury.  When  the  "  boom  "  is  a  thing  of  the  past  the  situation 
will  not  be  greatly  changed,  for  the  reason  that  there  is  no  other 
place  on  earth  where  a  life  without  toil  can  be  so  greatly  enjoyed. 

As  a  place  to  go,  a  land  in  which  to  escape  from  some  of  the  studied 
cruelties  of  winter,  a  country  to  live  in  in  chronic  tiredness  and 
changing  health,  California  has  no  equal.  It  does  not  quite  share 
the  fate  of  the  other  beautiful  countries.  They  are  nearly  always 
poor.  All  regions  of  mountains  and  sunshine;  of  pines  and  falling 
waters;  of  natural  beauty  and  wholesome  air;  are  good  for  little 
else; — all  but  this. 


6LIMATE. 


S  to  the  climatic  cure  for  chronic  diseases  which  come  under 
the  general  term  of  "  ill  health,"  all  grades  and  varieties  of 
sick  people  come  to  California.  There  are  several  chronic  com- 
plaints for  which  the  Pacific  coast  is  said  to  offer  certain  relief. 
Among  these  is  the  all-but-universal  hay-fever.  There  are  innu- 
merable people  here  who  have  for  some  years  been  rejoicing  at  the 
success  of  a  scheme  for  saving  their  lives  by  driving  mules  or 
pruning  trees. 

The  climate  of  the  whole  State  is  governed  largely  by  the  sea. 
From  April  to  October  the  current  of  cold  water  which  pours  south- 
ward out  of  Behring  Strait  has  a  temperature  of  fifty-three  degrees. 
The  north  and  north-west  winds  from  this,  meeting  the  south-west 
trade-wind,  bring  a  fog  which  often  wraps  itself  like  a  gray  cloak 
around  the  Coast  Range,  but  which  is  carried  into  the  interior  only  a 
short  distance  where  there  are  gaps  and  openings  in  the  range. 
There  are  at  least  two  distinct  climates;  the  coast  and  the  inland. 
These  two  have  each,  in  their  turn,  their  several  gradations.  In  one 
place  the  coast  will  be  unsuitable  for  invalids;  at  another  locality,  pos- 
sibly only  five  or  eight  miles  away,  it  will  be  found  entirely  different. 

(167) 


168 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


San  Diego  has  the  most  equable  and  changeless  climate  known, 
yet  some  of  the  bleakest  spots  on  earth  lie  in  sight  of  it.  A  mount- 
ain, even  a  ridge,  may  practically  change  the  climate  to  an  invalid. 
To  realize  this  fact  actual  presence  is  necessary.  The  State  has 
been  from  the  earliest  times  a  climatic  puzzle,  though  all  changes 
and  varieties  must  come  only  within  limits  \vhich  seem  very  narrow 
to  a  stranger.  One  grows  very  particular  after  a  little  while.  There 


Sierra  Madre  Villa-San  Bernardino  Valley. 

are  wraps  and  overcoats  in  plenty  on  a  dummy  train  between  San 
Diego  and  National  City,  for  instance,  though  it  be  August.  One 
of  the  places  is  only  five  or  six  miles  away,  but  exposed  to  the  sea- 
wind,  and  seems  to  be  looked  upon  very  much  as  Kansas  people 
look  upon  Dakota.  There  is  often  an  apprehension  of  cold  amusing 
to  a  stranger,  as  there  is  in  Mexico  or  the  West  Indies.  There  is 
comfort  in  a  fire  "to  get  up  by,"  in  a  California  valley  where  frost 


CLIMATE.  169^ 

has  never  been  known.  Overcoats,  or  pretences  of  overcoats,  are 
carried  and  worn  where  the  bitterest  cold,  actual  cold,  that  ever 
comes  would  not  wither  the  petals  of  a  hot-house  lily. 

These  sensations  are  largely  due  to  variety  of  surface.  In  the 
Valley  of  the  Amazon,  in  the  heart  of  tropical  Brazil,  Midnight 
and  Noon  are  nearly  the  same  the  whole  year  through.  Where 
there  are  hills  and  valleys,  a  wide  and  open  country  round,  and  the 
sea  near  at  hand,  the  sensations,  though  not  the  actual  changes  per- 
haps, are  very  different  at  noon,  night  and  morning. 

The  following  explanation  of  the  great  California!!  climatic  puzzle 
is  copied  from  one  of  the  numerous  immigration  publications,  and 
the  name  of  the  author  is  unknown: 

"  The  northern  boundary  of  California  is  at  about  latitude  42  de- 
grees north,  while  the  southern  boundary  is  very  nearly  at  32  degrees 
north  latitude.  On  the  Atlantic  coast,  Boston,  Massachusetts,  occu- 
pies very  nearly  the  same  relative  position  as  the  northern  boundary 
of  California,  and  the  city  of  Chicago  is  very  nearly  in  the  same 
latitude,  while  the  city  of  Savannah,  Georgia,  corresponds  with  the 
extreme  southern  boundary  of  California.  Wh'at  a  stretch  of  sea- 
coast  for  a  single  State! 

"One  fact  will  suffice  to  show  the  great  contrast  of  climates  as. 
between  the  Pacific  coast  and  the  Atlantic  coast.  At  Oroville,  in 
Butte  County,  which  is  very  near  the  4oth  parallel  of  north  latitude, 
oranges,  lemons,  limes,  pomegranates,  and  other  semi-tropical  fruits, 
are  produced  with  as  great  or  even  greater  success  than  the  same 
fruits  are  produced  on  the  coast  of  Florida,  uf.  the  3oth  parallel  of 
north  latitude,  or  720  miles  south  of  Boston  and  600  miles 
south  of  Oroville.  When  it  is  considered  that  but  for  the 
ameliorating  climatic  influences  of  the  Gulf  Stream,  Eastern 
Florida  could  not  successfully  produce  the  semi-tropical  fruits 
named,  and  that  Oroville  is  at  least  150  miles  inland  from  the  Pacific 
coast,  with  the  Coast  Range  of  mountains,  from  3,000  to  4.000  feet 
high,  intervening,  and  is  located  in  the  foot-hills  of  the  Sierra. 


170 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


Nevadas,  at  an  elevation  of  about  1,000  feet  above  the  sea,  some 
faint  conception  of  the  wonderful  contrast  between  the  climates  of 
the  Atlantic  and  Pacific  coasts  may  be  obtained. 


The  Big  Trees. 

"  Oroville  is  mentioned  simply  because  it  is  one  of  the  most  north- 
ern points  in  California  in  which  the  semi-tropical  fruits  have  been 


CLIMATE. 


171 


very  successfully  cultivated,  but  all  along  the  foot-hills  of  the  Sierra 
Nevada  mountains,  at  about  the  same  elevation  as  Oroville,  to  Los 
Angeles  county,  these  fruits  may  be,  and  have  been,  cultivated  with 
equal  success.  The  length  of  this  belt  of  country  is  about  400 
miles,  by  from  10  to  15  miles  wide. 

"  In  many  localities  in  and  along  the  east  base  of  the  Coast 
Range  of  mountains,  for  the  same  distance  north  and  south,  the 
tropical  fruits  are  cultivated  with  good  success.  The  wide,  open 
valleys  of  the  Sacramento  and  the  San  Joaquin  rivers  and  their 
large  tributaries,  are  not  so  favorable  for  the  cultivation  of  these 
fruits,  neither  in  the  composition  of  the  soil  nor  the  characteristics 
of  the  climate. 

"  Having  pointed  out  the  great  difference  of  the  climates  of  the 
Pacific  coast  and  the  Atlantic  coast,  by  a  reference  to  some  of  the 
productions  at  different  points,  attention  is  now  called  to  the  follow- 
ing table,  which  shows  the  contrast  as  indicated  by  the  thermometer. 

"  Taken  the  months  of  January  and  July  as  representing  the  ex- 
tremes of  heat  and  cold  of  the  year,  and  given  the  mean  temper- 
ature of  place  named  for  each  month,  points  in  California  are 
contrasted  with  other  points  in  the  United  States  and  Europe. 


PLACE. 

Jan. 

July. 

Dif. 

Lat. 

Deg. 

jO 

Deg. 
6-; 

Deg. 

CO 

D.  M. 

/>Q 

Genoa    Italy   •  •  •          .            •        

4b 
d6 

/  J 

77 

J°  34 

New  York   

•3  T 

77 

J  l 

d6 

44   *4 

48 

cS 

10 

4U  J/ 
oA    06 

Jacksonville    Florida                                               .  . 

<8 

80 

22 

^O    ^O 

46 

76 

•3Q 

AQ     CO 

Los  Angeles   Cal 

c  e 

67 

12 

•31      OJ. 

Savannah    Georgia 

•JQ 

82 

A9 

32  oo 

"  Thus  comparing  the  weather  in  January  and  July,  at  Sacramento, 
with  that  of  same  months  at  Chicago  and  New  York,  while  it  is 
thirty-five  degrees  colder  at  Chicago  in  January  than  at  Sacramento, 
it  is  but  ten  degress  cooler  in  July  at  Chicago  than  at  Sacramento,, 


17-2 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


-and  while  it  is  fourteen  degrees  colder  at  New  York  in  January  than 
at  Sacramento,  it  is  also  three  degrees  cooler  at  Sacramento  in  July 
than  at  New  York. 

"  Comparing  San  Francisco  weather  with  the  weather  at  Chicago 
and  New  York,  while  it  is  thirty-eight  degrees  warmer  in  winter  at 
San  Francisco  than  at  Chicago,  and  seventeen  degrees  warmer  than 
at  New  York,  it  is  five  degrees  cooler  in  San  Francisco  in  summer 
than  at  Chicago,  and  nineteen  degrees  cooler  in  San  Francisco  in 
summer  than  in  New  York. 


North  of  the  Range. 

"  Going  on  with  the  comparisons  as  between  the  places  named  in 
California,  and  those  named  on  the  Atlantic  coast  and  in  Europe,  it 
will  be  seen  that  the  extremes  between  winter  and  summer  in  Cali- 
fornia are  less  than  between  the  same  seasons  at  the  most  favored 
localties  on  the  Atlantic  slope  or  Europe.  In  other  words,  while 
there  are  warmer  winters  there  are  also  cooler  summers. 

"  In  addition  to  the  above  climatic  showings,  as  indicated  by  a  com- 
parison of  the  figures  of  the  thermometer,  owing  to  the  absence  of 
moisture  in  the  atmosphere  in  California  in  the  summer,  eighty 
degrees  of  heat,  as  shown  there  by  the  instrument,  is  less  oppressive 


CLIMATE. 


173 


than  sixty  degrees,  as  shown  by  the  instrument  on  the  Atlantic  coast 
or  in  Europe.  In  consequence  of  this  difference  in  the  state  of 
moisture  in  the  atmosphere,  sun-stroke  and  like  affections  are  un- 
known in  California. 

"  Owing  to  the  comparative  absence  of  moisture  in  the  air  in  Cali- 
fornia in  summer,  however  warm  the  day  may  be  while  the  sun  is 
present,  the  moment  he  has  gone  below  the  horizon  the  effects  of  his 
heating  influence  cease,  and  the  evenings  and  nights  are  cool. 
Everybody  sleeps  under  blankets. 

'•  For  a  more  full  exposition  of  the  climate  of  California,  aSj  com- 
pared with  the  world's  noted  climates,  we  give  the  following  table 
of  mean  temperature: 


PLACE. 

Jan. 

July. 

Dif. 

Lat. 

Austin    Texas  

D3T 

Deg. 

84 

Deg. 

48 

D.   M. 
on   an 

Borden,  Cal  

42 

80 

47 

36  OO 

'Cinninnati    Ohio                                                  ... 

2  1 

77 

e,6 

•7r)     06 

City  of  Mexico    

C2 

6q 

j  i 

IQ    26 

Caliente    Cal 

46 

02 

46 

Delano    Cal     

47 

86 

OQ 

JD  *-"-* 

ae    no 

Dijon    France  

oq 

70 

•37 

47    CO 

Kort  Yuma   Arizona 

c0 

02 

-16 

Gilory   Cal  

J.  I 

9* 

78 

•17 

J^   4J 
-77    OQ 

•Goshen    Cal  

e  i 

oi 

40 

36  oo 

Honolulu    S    I 

71 

78 

21    l6 

Hollister    Cal     .... 

48 

71 

oc 

oA   oo 

C2 

ci 

6 

16  ^6 

Milan    Italy 

•3-7 

7.1 

41 

New  Orleans   Louisiana      

c  e 

82 

27 

2O    H7 

Naples    Italy     

46 

76 

OQ 

4O    f>2 

Pajaro   Cal 

4O 

eg 

Richmond    Virginia      .              

V* 

7-1 

77 

44 

•17    oo 

Santa  Barbara    Cal  

66 

IO 

•3/1      2J. 

San  Diego   Cal 

e  7 

6e 

g 

Stockton    Cal     .  .          ...                ...        

4Q 

72 

27. 

07    cfi 

San  Mateo   Cal             

46 

CQ 

I  "^ 

•77    OO 

San  Jose,  Cal  

46 

6q 

23 

'27   oo 

Salinas    Cal                                                  

4.7 

6$ 

18 

36  oo 

Soledad,  Cal  

4*2 

7O 

27 

36  oo 

^St.  Augustine,  Florida  

Co 

77 

18 

3O   O^ 

Vallejo,  Cal  

48 

67 

IQ 

og  o«; 

"  A  short  statement  of  the  peculiar  causes  that  help  to  form  the 
many  climates  of  California,  will  help  the  reader  the  better  to  under- 
stand them. 


CLIMATE.  175 

"  The  Golden  Gate  pass  is  an  opening  several  miles  long  but  of  less 
width,  through  the  Coast  Range  of  mountains,  and  is  the  only  com- 
plete break  or  pass  in  the  Coast  Range,  from  the  southern  to  the 
northern  end  of  the  basin  to  which  it  forms  the  outlet. 

"Directly  opposite  the  Golden  Gate,  across  the  bay  of  San  Fran- 
cisco, and  several  miles  inland,  stands  the  world-famed  Diablo 
mountain — apparently  representing  a  section  of  the  Coast  Range, 
which,  by  some  ancient  disturbance,  had  been  cut  out  of  the  space 
now  known  as  the  Golden  Gate — and  moved  bodily  inland,  and 
placed  firmly  on  its  base  again.  Now,  this  Golden  Gate  pass  and 
Mount  Diablo  together  form  the  key  to  the  climate  of  the  interior 
of  northern  California.  Without  such  pass  as  an  outlet  to  the  inte- 
rior waters,  the  great  basin  would  be  an  inland  lake.  Without  such 
pass  as  an  inlet  to  the  currents  of  moisture-laden  atmosphere  from 
the  ocean,  the  same  basin  would  be  like  an  oven-heated,  arid  desert. 
Keeping  the  above  statements  and  formation  of  the  country  in  mind, 
the  reader  is  prepared  to  follow  the  explanation  of  the  natural 
causes  that  produce  the  climate  of  interior  California. 

"The  trade  winds  of  the  Pacific  ocean  are  constant  winds  blowing 
from  near  the  equator  in  a  north-easterly  direction.  These  winds 
are,  of  course,  warm,  and  carry  with  them  large  amounts  of  warm 
moisture  in  suspension.  Were  there  no  break  in  the  Coast  Range 
of  mountains,  they  would  simply  float  above  them  and  over  the  basin 
of  the  interior,  without  condensation,  and  without  leaving  any 
moisture  in  the  form  of  rain,  winter  or  summer.  As  it  is,  however, 
in  the  summer  these  trade  winds  unite  with  the  cooler  winds  that 
sweep  down  the  coast  from  the  north — Alaska  and  Behring  Straits — 
and  entering  the  Golden  Gate  pass,  strike  Mount  Diablo  and  divide, 
the  larger  portion  sweeping  up  the  Sacramento  valley,  and  the  lesser 
portion  up  the  San  Joaquin  valley — thus  producing  in  both  these 
valleys,  in  the  summer,  dry  but  delightfully  cool  summer  breezes,  or 
tempered  trade  winds. 

"These  breezes  generally  begin  about  noon,  and  last  till  about 
12 


176 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


midnight  of  each  day.    Thus  is  produced  the  general  summer  climate 
of  the  interior  valleys,  the  cloudless  days  and  cool  nights.     And 


^    The  Three  Brothe4«-Yo  Semite 


thus  is  accounted  for  the  fact  that  the  San  Joaquin  valley  has,  as  a 
rule,  the  warmer  climate  in  the  summer,  and  also  the  fact  that  in 
the  upper  or  extreme  northern  end  of  the  Sacramento  valley  the 


CLIMATE.  177 

weather  is  warmer  than  at  points  nearer  the  Golden  Gate,  hundreds 
of  miles  further  south.  Both  these  uniting  currents  of  air  being 
comparatively  dry  in  the  summer  season,,  and  coming  in  contact,  in 
the  valley,  with  no  cool  current  or  surface,  no  condensation  takes 
piace,  and  we  have  no  rain  in  summer. 

"  Now  for  the  winter  climate  of  the  interior.  But  for  the  opening 
at  the  Golden  Gate  and  the  ingress  at  that  point  of  winds  from 
the  ocean,  the  winter  climate  of  the  interior  would  be  dry  and  cold, 
and  probably  without  even  snow  to  cover  and  moisten  the  soil. 
As  it  is,  however,  just  at  the  time  when  there  is  a  tendency  to  cold 
in  the  valley,  from  the  absence  of  the  rays  of  the  summer  sun,  the 
presence  of  that  sun  further  south  over  the  Pacific  ocean  heats  up 
the  water  and  air  there  to  a  greater  degree,  and  the  trade  winds 
come  north  with  greater  vigor  and  constancy,  and  meeting  at  the 
same  time  more  fierce  and  colder  winds  from  the  northern  coast, 
storm  centres  are  formed  out  at  sea,  and  awaiting  some  escape  for 
their  furious  natures,  very  naturally  float  in  at  the  Golden  Gate, 
and,  dividing  as  they  strike  Mount  Diablo,  find  their  way  up  both 
valleys,  discharging  the  accumulated  moisture  as  they  go.  But 
instead  of  bringing  with  them  a  lower  degree  of  temperature  and 
•  colder  weather,  as  on  the  Atlantic  coast,  these  storms  of  the  Pacific 
modify  the  temperature,  and  end  in  warmer  weather.  The  plain 
reason  is  that  they  come  from  toward  the  equator,  and  bring  warm 
.air  with  them. 

"  The  great  variety  of  configuration  of  the  valleys,  presenting  end- 
less checks  and  breakwinds  to  the  ocean  air  as  it  comes  in  at  the 
Golden  Gate  and  spreads  out,  fanshaped,  and  sweeps  up  the  country, 
causes  corresponding  variations  of  climate.  Hence,  even  in  the  great 
valleys,while  compared  to  the  climate  of  the  Atlantic  coast  and  Missis- 
sippi valley  States,  this  is  mild  winter  and  summer ;  still  both  in  winter 
and  summer  we  have  almost  endless  degrees  of  mildness,  amounting, 
practically,  to  a  different  climate  for  each  location.  This  brings 
.about  wonderful  and  almost  incredible  variations  and  conditions. 


(178) 


CLIMATE.  179 

"  But  when  we  leave  the  valleys  and  go  up  the  foot-hills  toward 
either  range  of  mountains,  we  come  in  contact  with  still  greater 
varieties  of  climate.  The  general  slightly  undulating  elevations  of 
these  foot-hills  have  a  climate  varying  but  little  in  its  general 
character  from  the  climate  of  the  lower  valleys  adjacent.  But  when 
we  enter  the  thousand  and  one  small  valleys  running  up  to  and 
losing  themselves  in  the  equal  number  of  gulches  and  mountain 
•canons,  some  penetrating  the  mountain  ranges  at  right  angles,  some 
presenting  their  funnel-shaped  mouths  or  approaches  directly  to  the 
currents  of  the  ocean  air,  and  thus  leading  it  in  and  giving  it  direc- 
tion into  their  recesses,  and  some  still  opening  out  into  the  large 
valleys  behind  projecting  spurs  that  turn  away  and  exclude  these 
prevailing  breezes  from  the  small  valley,  at  the  gates  of  which  they 
seem  to  stand  as  constant  and  watchful  sentinels,  in  each  of  these 
valleys  we  find  a  climate,  though  always  mild,  still  in  many  par- 
ticulars differing  from  the  climate  of  each  of  the  other  valleys  of 
the  same  general  character. 

"  These  small  valleys  are  found  at  all  elevations  up  the  mountain 
slopes,  from  five  hundred  to  five  thousand  feet  above  the  level  of 
the  sea,  and  each  in  turn  is  affected  by  climatic  influences,  accord- 
ing to  its  altitude  or  elevation. 

"  Under  such  circumstances  it  is  plain  that  the  lowest  parts  or 
troughs  of  a  valley  will,  under  the  influence  of  the  sun's  rays, 
become  the  warmest  section  of  the  valley. 

"  It  is  plain,  also,  that  the  moment  the  sun  sinks  below  the  western 
horizon,  and  thus  removes  the  heating  influence,  this  warm  air  in  the 
trough  of  the  valley  would,  being  rarefied  and  lighter  than  the  air 
resting  on  the  mountain  slopes  above,  begin  to  rise,  and  the  air 
above  on  all  sides  would  begin  to  run  like  water  to  the  lowest 
point,  and  thus  in  the  latter  part  of  the  night  and  the  morning 
the  lowest  point  in  the  valley  would  be  full  of  cold  instead  of  warm 
air,  and  would  in  turn  become  the  coldest  section  of  the  valley. 
If  frost  occurred  anywhere,  it  would  be  in  this  low  trough.  At 


180  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

some  point  up  the  mountain  side  there  might,  under  such  circum- 
stances, be  found  a  warmer  place  or  belt  of  air  than  could  be 
found  above  or  below  it.  If  so,  this  would  be  a  thermal,  or  warm 
belt.  But  the  mountain  sides,  instead  of  being  a  smooth  inclined 
plane,  are  cut  by  high  ridges,  on  the  upper  sides  of  which  are 
canyons  or  gulches,  leading  off  in  different  directions  down  toward 
and  into  the  valley  below. 

"  In  the  middle  of  the  day,  therefore,  under  the  heating  influence 
of  the  sun's  perpendicular  rays,  the  middle  or  trough  of  the  valley 
becomes  the  warmest.  At  night,  the  sun  being  below  the  horizon, 
this  warm  air  begins  to  rise  and  the  cold  air  up  the  mountain  sides 
begins,  like  water,  to  run  down.  But  it  can  not  run  down  all  in  one 
sheet,  but,  like  water,  it  runs  down  the  canyons  and  gulches  and 
seeks  the  valley  in  streams  or  currents.  Within  the  line  of  these 
streams  or  currents  of  cold  air  it  is  plain  there  will  be  a  cold  streak 
or  section  of  country,  whether  high  up  the  mountain  side  or  lower 
down  in  the  valley.  But  on  the  lower  side  of  the  ridges,  which 
check  the  descending  cold  air  and  hold  it  in  streams  or  currents 
and  turn  it  down  the  ravines,  it  is  plain  there  must  be  a  warm  sec- 
tion or  belt  where  the  heated  air  of  the  day  remains  quiet  and 
undisturbed,  like  still  water  along  some  bends  or  eddies  of  a  great 
river.  Here,  too,  the  warm  air  of  the  lower  valley,  rising,  finds  a 
quiet  resting  place  and  helps  to  keep  the  section  warm  and  balmy. 

"Thus  are  produced  the  warm  belts  of  California,  the  warm  belts 
in  the  west  and  mountainous  sections  of  Virginia  and  North  Caro- 
lina, and  the  eastern  sections  of  Tennessee  and  West  Virginia 
Thus  it  is,  that  on  account  of  the  warm  current  of  air  from  the 
equator,  sweeping  up  the  valleys  during  the  winter  season,  combined 
with  this  peculiar  natural  phenomena  we  have  just  described,  that  in 
California,  at  a  latitude  but  little  below  Boston  and  Chicago,  they 
can  grow  oranges,  limes  and  lemons,  ripening  in  December,  and  pro- 
duce cherries,  peaches,  apricots,  nectarines  and  many  of  the  smaller 
fruits  and  berries,  and  vegetables,  ripe  and  ready  for  market  before 


CLIMATE. 


181 


the  blossoms  appear  on  the  same  kinds  of  trees  in  the  same  latitude 
east  of  the  Rocky  mountains." 

The  foregoing  may  be  taken  as  a  fair  explanation  of  the  well- 
known  curiosities  of  the  puzzle,  at  least  so  far  as  northern  Cal- 
ifornia is  concerned.  The  additional  modifying  causes  in  the  case 
of  Southern  California  have  been  mentioned  in  preceding  pages. 
It  should  also  be  remembered  that  the  Pacific  is  full  of  currents;  the 
one  coming  down  through  Behring  Strait  having  a  low  temperature 
as  mentioned.  All  winds  off  of  the  Pacific  seem  cool,  almost  cold, 
when  they  reach  one  round  a  point  or  through  a  notch  direct.  When 
in  Winter,  one  sees  the  snow  on  the  north  side  of  the  San  Bernar- 
dino Range,  and  the  flowers  on  the  south  side,  and  observes  that  the 
difference  is  made  by  coming  southward  through  Cajon  Pass,  it  has 
a  tendency  to  produce  in  his  mind  a  high  regard  for  merely  local  in- 
fluences. The  question  of  the  difference  between  a  valley  and  a 
ridge  is  one  of  prime  importance  only  to  the  more  delicate  class  of 
health-seekers.  To  the  average  eastern  man  the  execrated  and  ab- 
jured climate  of  San  Francisco  does  not  seem  so  very  bad.  Com- 
pared with  anything  known  east  of  the  Rocky  Mountains,  every 
nook  of  the  State  is  a  revelation. 


182 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


Boundary-Line  Monument,  near  San  Diego. 


IN    0-ENERAL 


IOMING  down  from  Barstow  to  San  Bernardino  there  is  a 
suggestion  of  a  river  on  the  right.  It  is  a  desert  stream  called 
the  Mojave  ( Mo-A#//-ve ),  beginning  and  ending  on  the  north  side 
of  the  range.  Its  ultimate  destination  is  the  "  Sink  "  of  Mojave  ; 
a  lake  of  gray  mud  or  sand,  passed  before  reaching  Barstow. 

During  the  afternoon  the  train  traverses  the  range  which  is  the 
climatic  fence  of  Southern  California,  through  Cajon  ( Ca.h-/wne : 
a  box)  Pass.  The  scenery  here,  especially  in  Winter,  is  very 
striking.  The  road  is  very  crooked,  and  the  cuts  very  deep 
and  narrow,  not  through  rock,  but  through  a  peculiar  deep-yellow 
soil.  Often  the  head  of  the  long  train  may  be  seen  apparently  de- 
tached and  running  alone  on  the  other  side  of  the  hill  from  the 
passenger.  These  long  and  narrow  cuts  were  made  by  the  engineers 
with  perfect  impunity.  All  the  snow  that  falls,  even  on  the  north- 
•ern  side,  scarce  serves  for  more  than  the  tracking  of  the  big  Cali- 
fornia hare. 

Once  through  the  pass,  and  you  may  see  the  glitter  of  the  electric 
lights  at  San  Bernardino. 

This  is  the  point  on  the  California  Southern  road  whence  you  go 
either  southward  to  San  Diego,  or  turn  westward  to  Los  Angeles. 
A  glance  at  the  map  will  explain. 

If  the  journey  be  'direct  to  San  Francisco  by  this  route,  the  car 
•does  not  turn  southward  at  Barstow,  but  goes  direct  to  Mojave, 
seventy-two  miles  further  west,  and  thence  northward  to  San  Fran- 
cisco. It  will  be  seen  that  the  same  journey  can  be  made  via  South- 
ern California,  by  going  to  San  Bernardino,  from  there  to  San 
Diego;  back  again  via  San  Bernardino  to  Los  Angeles,  or  more 

(183) 


184  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

directly  via  Oceanside  and  through  Santa  Ana,  and  northward  from 
Los  Angeles  through  Soledad  Pass  to  Mojave  and  thence  to  San 
Francisco.  The  extensions  of  the  railroad  system  of  Southern  Cali- 
fornia within  the  past  two  years  offer  one  of  the  most  striking 
features  of  the  contrast  between  the  old  and  the  new,  and  by  this 
journey  alone,  almost  without  leaving  the  cars,  a  general  view  of  the 
country  may  be  obtained,  and  all  the  contrasts  of  shore,  valley,  and 
mountain  be  obtained. 

North  of  Mojave,  going  either  direct  by  Barstow,  or  by  way  of 
Southern  California,  you  enter  through  the  Tehachapi  Pass  the 
valley  of  the  San  Joaquin,  and  are  in  the  California  of  the  old  times. 
Here  is  the  remarkable  engineering  work  called  the  Loop,  and  the 
name  more  or  less  accurately  describes  it.  This  scene,  even  by 
night,  especially  if  the  moon  shines,  is  a  very  remarkable  one. 

In  a  pocket  at  the  southern  end  of  the  San  Joaquin  Valley  are 
clustered  the  three  shallow  lakes,  Tulare,  Buena  Vista  and  Kern. 
They  are  not  considered  places  of  interest. 

From  the  station  of  Berenda,  on  the  Southern  Pacific  road,  there 
is  a  short  line  constructed  to  Raymond,  saving  that  much  horseback 
or  stage  on  the  way  to  Yo  Semite  and  the  Big  Tree  groves. 

There  are  three  Big  Tree  groves  in  California,  that  most  frequently 
visited  being  the  Mariposa  grove,  included  in  the  same  tour  with  the 
Yo  Semite.  It  is  almost  useless  to  attempt  a  new  description  of 
these  wonderful  places,  which  thousands  have  crossed  the  sea  to 
visit.  The  enterprise  of  modern  journalism  sometimes  discovers 
somewhere  else  bigger  trees  than  these  are,  but  the  locality  always 
remains  doubtful.  As  they  are,  they  have  been  drawn,  described, 
photographed  and  wondered  over  thousands  of  times.  The  Sequoia 
seems  to  remain  the  sole  living  representative  of  a  race  of  giants 
that  will  never  come  again.  These  are  but  the  stragglers  of  a  host, 
outliving  their  time.  All  over  these  mountain  sides  there  are  great 
trenches  where  they  have  fallen,  perhaps  a  thousand  years  being 
passed  in  their  slow  decay.  It  is  not  even  known  how  old  these 


IN   GENERAL. 


185- 


living  ones  are,  whether  they  are  yet  growing,  or  how   long  they 
may  stand. 

The  Yo  Semite  Valley,  very  briefly  described,  is  an  irregular  basin 
about  eight  miles  long  and  two  miles  wide,  whose  sides  are  irregular 
walls  of  rock  about  two  miles  high.  The  rim  of  this  amphitheatre 
has  notched  edges.  Of  the  special  points  in  the  edge  to  which 
names  have  been  given,  the  following  are  some:  Mount  Starr  King, 
(named  after  the  eloquent  divine  of  that  name,  who  lived  at  San 
Francisco  and  who  died  some  years  ago),  5,600  feet;  Cloud's  Rest,. 


ear  San   Diego. 


6,034  feet;  South  Dome,  4,737  feet;  Sentinel  Dome,  4,500  feet;  El 
Capitan,  3,300  feet. 

The  lowest  point  in  the  rim  of  the  valley  which  has  been  specially 
named  is  1,800  feet.  It  must  be  readily  observed,  even  on  paper, 
that  these  are  very  unusual  elevations  to  be  grouped  around  an 
amphitheatre  in  such  a  manner  that  most  of  them  are  included  in 
one  view. 

There  are  eleven  water-falls,  one  of  them,  the  Yo  Semite,  being 
2,634  feet  high,  while  the  Sentinel  measures  3,000  feet.  By  way  of 


186  OVERLAND   GUIDE. 

comparison,  it  may  be  recalled  that  there  are  5,280  feet  in  a  mile, 
and  that  Niagara  is  only  163  feet  high.  Places  and  falls  that  are 
pigmies  compared  to  these  have  a  celebrity  that  is  world-wide. 
Might  not  one  better  visit  California  first  and  Europe  afterwards  ? 

Yet  comparisons,  heights  and  depths,  absolute  statements,  have 
little  to  do  with  it.  You  cannot  quite  comprehend  it  even  after  you 
are  there. 

SAN  FRANCISCO  is  still  a  place  unique,  and  notwithstanding  its 
tens  of  thousands  of  annual  visitors,  and  all  their  letters  and  con- 
versations afterwards,  still  worth  seeing.  The  long,  deep  Bay  of 
San  Francisco,  on  whose  shore  the  track  lies  for  thirty  miles  or  more, 
is  interesting  to  that  man  especially  who  feels  that  now  the  ocean 
which  bounds  his  western  shore  is  reached  at  last. 

The  tourist  has  now  practically  reached  the  end  of  a  journey 
whose  western  terminus  is  in  the  land  of  contradictions  and  curiosi- 
ties. It  is  in  no  sense  a  wilderness.  The  facilities  of  convenient 
travel  are  on  every  hand,  and  on  every  hand  is  a  place  to  go,  a 
change  of  climate,  a  mountain  resort,  a  watering-place.  This  most 
favored  land  on  earth  is  in  no  respect  behind  the  times  in  every  ar- 
tificial luxury  of  the  century.  A  thousand  pages  would  be  inade- 
quate to  describe  what  might  be  done. 

But  all  of  us  carry  to  California  and  elsewhere,  our  preconceived 
ideas.  These  govern  us  wherever  we  may  go.  There  is  little  use 
for  them; — as  little  as  there  can  be  anywhere  on  the  planet, — in  any 
•of  the  various  States  and  Territories  briefly  described  in  this  volume, 
and  in  California  perhaps  least  of  all.  In  every  respect  it  is  a 
curious  country,  and  often  seems  not  to  be  known  well  as  yet  even 
by  the  oldest  settler.  There  are  facts  that  indicate  that  the  country, 
like  Australia,  was  originally  intended  to  be  left  by  itself. 

It  is  comparatively  rainless,  yet  there  are  places  where  eighty 
inches  of  water  fall  in  a  year. 

It  is  the  land  of  all  the  world  for  flowers,  yet  a  great  portion  of  it 
45  heart-breaking,  hopeless,  despairing  desert. 


IN    GENERAL.  187 

It  can,  and  will,  produce  wine  enough  to  supply  the  epicurean 
tables  of  the  world.  Yet  there  is  but  one  species  of  native  grape  ; 
all  the  rest  have  been  imported  as  experiments; — and  all  grew. 

The  trees  are  not  only  indigenous,  but  are  mostly  confined  to  this 
coast.  The  three  species  of  the  Sequoia,  including  the  redwood, 
never  grew  elsewhere.  Yet  you  may  look  in  vain  for  familiar  trees 
like  the  maple,  hickory,  bass-wood,  gum-tree,  persimmon,  sassa- 
fras, birch,  chestnut,  or  almost  any  others  that  would  make  the 
woods  look  home-like.  It  is  the  only  place  in  the  world  where 
Torrey's  Pine  has  been  found.  This  rarest  tree  on  earth  grows 
even  here  in  only  one  locality,  and  you  may  see  a  few  of  them 
near  the  station  of  Del  Mar,  on  the  California  Southern  road.  The 
lawns  smile  with  grass  that  does  not  grow  elsewhere.  Even  the 
trees  which  have  familiar  names  are  unlike  the  trees  of  the  same 
name  in  the  East.  There  is  an  extensive  and  beautiful  family  of 
smaller  and  greater  growths,  all  differing  in  appearance  and  nature 
from  what  we  would  imagine  they  were  from  their  familiar  names. 

Of  birds,  there  are  some  three  hundred  and  fifty  species  native  to 
the  country.  Of  these,  twenty  kinds  are  woodpeckers.  There  are 
thirty-seven  different  birds  of  prey,  and  among  these,  twelve  kinds. 
of  owls.  None  of  these  have  ever  lived  elsewhere. 

Out  of  one  hundred  and  fifteen  kinds  of  mammals,  twenty-seven 
are  carnivorous.  Yet  the  familiar  animals  of  youth,  the  woodchuck, 
'possum,  wolverine,  mink,  musk-rat,  otter,  and  beaver  all  are  want- 
ing. Our  familiar  rat  is  not  there,  but  his  place  is  fully  and  credit- 
ably filled  by  another,  who  keeps  up  the  family  reputation.  Califor- 
nia has  not  even  our  familiar  family  mouse,  but  the  place  of  the  poor 
little  bead-eyed  victim  of  universal  feminine  vindictiveness  is  taken 
by  another  who  is  represented  as  "having  a  more  fuzzy  tail"; — teeth 
and  general  propensities  probably  very  much  the  same.  There  is 
also  a  jerboa,  or  jumping,  kangaroo  mouse,  and  another  who  seems 
a  unique  and  interesting  combination  of  mouse  and  squirrel. 

All  our  familiar  squirrels  are  missing,  red,  gray  and  fox.     There. 


188 


OVERLAND    GUIDE. 


-are  not  even  chipmunks.  Above  a  certain  elevation  there  is  a  squir- 
rel, but  he  doesn't  act  and  bark  like  our  gray  squirrel,  and  must  be 
passed  as  a  Californian.  The  squirrel  of  the  country  can  climb,  but 
won't,  and  has  decided  to  live  on  the  ground.  His  numbers,  like 
other  things  of  the  country,  are  amazing,  and  while  he  is  good  eat- 
ing, nobody  kills  him  because  he  is  too  easily  hunted.  He  is  said  to 
be  entirely  capable  of  visiting  the  dining-room  and  eating  the  butter 
off  of  the  middle  of  the  table  before  the  family  can  be  seated. 


California  Orange  Tree. 

Nearly  all  these  beasts  can  do  without  water.  They  wait  until  it 
rains,  and  if  it  does  not  rain  in  time  they  go  to  sleep  and  wait. 

"Molly  Cotton-tail  "  does  not  live  in  California,  but  her  place  is 
taken  by  four  or  five  varieties  of  hares,  one  of  them  a  monster  weigh- 
nine  or  ten  pounds,  who  regards  the  utmost  efforts  of  the  ordinary 
dog  with  cool  contempt.  There  is  a  little  cotton-tail  too,  but  almost 
totally  unlike  her  of  the  Middle  and  Eastern  States 


IN   GENERAL.  189 

The  birds  have  features  and  feathers  like  their  cousins  in  the 
East  in  many  cases,  but  when  they  have  they  act  so  differently  that 
one  wonders  what  ails  them.  It  is  a  country  where  robins  take  to 
the  mountains,  where  the  mocking-bird  is  credited  with  but  eight 
notes  sung  over  and  over,  where  the  meadow-lark  is  a  hermit  of  the 
chaparral,  where  the  big  "  crow  "  blackbird  has  assumed  the  habits  of 
his  little  brown  cousin  and  sits  on  the  cows'  backs,  and  where  the  wood- 
pecker spends  most  of  his  time  picking  up  ants  and  beetles  on  the 
ground.  Jenny  Wren,  darling  of  childhood,  is  not  here,  but  her  place  is 
taken  by  a  wee  gray  cock-tail  about  half  her  size,  or  by  another  as 
big,  but  not  of  her  color,  that  "  never  looks  too  fine.'*  These,  how- 
ever, are  so  glib  and  pert  that  there  is  no  doubt  about  their  being 
wrens.  Our  King  Bird  has  degenerated  here  into  a  "  drab-coated 
rascal  that  lives  on  nothing  but  bees,  and  wakes  one  an  hour  before 
dawn  with  notes  like  the  filing  of  a  saw." 

Among  insects,  ants  of  all  varieties,  and  all  grades  of  industry 
and  vindicj-iveness,  swarm  from  the  coast  to  the  mountain-tops. 
Some  are  almost  as  tiny  as  chigoes,  while  others  have  a  fearful 
bigness. 

The  wild  bee,  buzzing  everywhere,  and  even  occupying  the  deserted 
and  decaying  mission-buildings  to  the  exclusion  of  other  visitors,  is 
not  "wild"  at  all.  There  were  no  bees  in  all  this  land  of  flowers 
until  they  had  escaped  from  those  who  brought  them  here  from  the 
East.  There  is,  among  a  half-dozen  kinds,  a  wasp  nearly  two  inches 
long.  There  are  two  or  three  kinds  of  bumble-bees,  none  of  them 
belonging  to  the  bee  family.  One  of  them  looks  like  "  a  cross  be- 
tween a  bat  and  a  humming-bird,"  and  another  is  of  enormous  size 
and  hums  like  a  deep  bass  reed. 

There  is  a  tarantula  that  can  bite  through  a  green  twig  as  large  as 
a  lead  pencil,  that  lives  in  a  satin-lined  hole  closed  with  a  lid  with  a 
perfect  hinge,  that  is  a  beast  of  prey  in  all  senses.  Yet  there  is  a 
wasp  ferocious  enough,  and  big  enough,  to  kill  him  whenever  he  can 
be  caught  away  from  his  aesthetic  and  elegant  habitation. 


190 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


There  are  beetles  big  and  little,  gray,  brown,  yellow,  purple,  blue, 
crimson,  banded,  striped,  long-geared,  stubby,  soft,  hard,  flying, 
jumping,  and  snap-backed.  Yet  the  cockroach  and  bed-bug  are 
almost  or  quite  unknown.  But  many  a  car-load  of  baggage  and 
household  goods  has  gone  across,  and  if  one  of  them  should  get 
away  from  his  nook  in  these,  there  is  nothing  to  hinder  his  assump- 
tion of  family  habits,  and  getting  a  living  and  begetting  a  numerous 
offspring,  somehow. 


A  Nook  on  the  Coast 

There  are,  so  far  as  yet  counted,  ten  separate  families  of  mosqui- 
toes. It  is  a  consolatory  statement  that  "some  of  them  do  not  bite." 
Then  again,  others  do. 

There  are  two  or  three  varieties  of  fleas.  Some  of  them  only  live 
upon  hares  and  rabbits,  and  do  not  bite  people.  But  he  who  does  is 
"  a  savage  wretch  that  never  wearies  of  anything  except  the  old 
place.  He  takes  a  new  spot  every  second."  It  is  comforting  to  know 
that  he,  being  select  in  his  tastes,  does  not  bite  everybody.  It  is  alsa 
kind  of  him  to  disappear  in  Winter  entirely. 

There  are  two  kinds  of  scorpions.     They  are  not  abundant,  and 


IN   GENERAL.  191 

only  traditionally,  perhaps,  come  and  get  into  bed  with  you.  There 
is  a  gigantic  earwig  called  a  centipede,  six  or  eight  inches  long,  but 
keeping  generally  to  himself  in  his  lowly  habits  of  life. 

There  are  innumerable  lizards,  of  all  sizes,  from  eight  to  ten 
inches  in  length  downward.  Most  of  them  are  agile  and  beautiful, 
and  all  are  harmless.  There  are  none  of  the  familiar  tree-toads  that 
chirp  our  brief  Summer  nights  away. 

California  snakes  all  hibernate  even  in  the  very  warmest  localities, 
where  there  is  never  frost.  The  only  poisonous  snake  is  the  rattle- 
snake. They  are  rare  and  sluggish. 

Notwithstanding  the  apparently  formidable  array  of  reptiles  and 
insects  one  could  make  out  in  this  prolific  country,  the  Californian 
would  gladly  take  ten  times  the  number  he  has  of  centipedes,  scor- 
pions, lizards,  snakes,  beetles  and  earthquakes,  rather  than  give  up 
his  present  immunity  from  wind-storms,  hydrophobia,  sun-stroke,  hay- 
fever  and  lightning.  The  best  writer  on  California  topics,  Mr.  Van 
Dyke,  says  "  the  whole  number  of  persons  in  the  whole  southern 
half  of  the  State  (where  thousands  sleep  all  Summer  on  the  open 
ground)  injured  by  snakes  and  poisonous  reptiles,  animals,  etc., 
in  the  last  ten  years,  is  not  equal  to  the  number  killed  by  lightning 
alone  in  one  year  in  one  county  in  many  Eastern  States,  to  say 
nothing  of  cyclones,  mad  dogs,  etc." 

Of  flowers  it  is  entirely  useless  to  begin  to  write.  The  green- 
houses that  wealthy  people  build,  adorned  with  stucco  rocks,  and 
with  waterfalls  that  remind  one  of  an  accidental  leak,  and  that  are 
warmed  with  coils  of  plumber's  pipe,  or  with  the  uncongenial  heat  of 
a  furnace,  show  all  over  the  land  the  appreciation  in  which  are  held 
what  to  many  gentle  souls  are  the  sweetest  and  choicest  gifts  of 
heaven  ; — the  flowers.  Yet  all  the  contrivances  of  art  never  pro- 
duced under  glass  anything  to  equal  a  nook  in  the  forest,  a  corner 
by  the  wayside,  or  a  poor  man's  door-yard,  in  the  Californian  mid- 
winter. Of  infinite  variety  naturally,  nearly  all  of  delicate  tints  and 
beautiful  forms  ;  a  natural  flora  in  its  season  the  most  varied  and 

13 


193 


OVERLAND   GUIDE. 


beautiful  on  earth  ;  they  have  been  supplemented  by  every  exotic  of 
the  tropics.  The  hillsides  that  dazzled  the  wanderer  with  a  blaze  of 
color  from  acres  and  roods  of  pink,  great  fields  of  violets,  vast 
reaches  of  blue,  endless  sweeps  of  white,  were  not  enough.  The 
most  beautiful  flowers  and  trees  of  the  world  now  grow  and  bloom 
in  California.  The  long,  dry  Summer  has  its  compensation  when 
the  rains  of  this  glorious  Winter  begin  to  fall.  Without  doubt  or 
question  it  is  the  realm  of  flowers. 


s  A  HEALTH  RES0RT. 


The  last  man  who  asks  a  question  about  this  land  of  contradic- 
tions will  be  he  who  wishes  to  know  if  he  will  recover  his  health  if 
he  should  go  there. 

The  general  character  of  the  seasons  has  been  considered  on 
previous  pages.  Dry,  damp,  cold,  hot,  may  be  found  with  all  their 
variations  within  a  few  miles  of  travel;  only  the  very  damp  and  the 
actual  cold  are  a  little  scarce.  Many  an  invalid  has  been  sadly  dis- 
appointed, while  many  another  has  been  cured.  There  may  be  for 
you  little  or  nothing  in  any  climate.  You  have  waited  until  you  are 
almost  dead,  according  to  a  time-honored  American  custom.  There 
is  bad  weather  in  California,  as  there  is  in  all  lands,  and  some  of  it 
may  seem  to  you  awful;  as  when  the  dust  that  has  been  lying  in  the 
roads  as  fine  as  wheaten  flour  for  months  is  driven  by  the  winds; 
when  the  chill  of  the  early  morning  strikes  you  so  hard  that  you 
look  with  wonder  upon  the  blooming  exotics  that  do  not  wither; 
when  the  gray  fog  which  has  blown  in  from  the  sea  through  a  notch 
in  the  mountains  wraps  you  like  a  cloak  because  you  are  not  quite 
high  enough  to  be  above  it;  when  the  "night  air," — the  dread  of 
our  grandmothers, — chills  you  to  the  bone  without  turning  the  petals 
of  a  single  rose. 

But  you  may  rely  upon  the  fact  that  the  fogs  disappear;  that  the 
night  is  followed  by  a  day  almost  always  warm,  bright,  beautiful; 
that  the  winds  are  always  dry,  always  above  fifty-five  degrees, 
and  that  there  are  places  enough  where  they  can  scarcely  be  felt 
at  all. 

Of  all  things  do  not  make  the  not  unusual  mistake  of  going  in  the 
Winter  and  coming  away  in  the  Summer,  under  the  impression  that 

(193) 


194 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


you  cannot  stand  the  heat,  the  malaria,  the  insects,  the  drynes.s,  or 
that  you  must  go  back  anyhow,  and  attend  to  business.  It  is  dis- 
tinctly not  like  Florida,  where  the  only  thing  to  go  for  is  the  Winter. 
The  almost  universal  testimony  by  those  who  should  know  is  that  if 
you  are  to  receive  any  benefit  of  permanent  value  you  are  likely  to 
get  it  in  the  Summer  of  Southern  California.  Often-^  they  say,  it  is 
the  Summer  only  that  cures.  Do  not  return  at  its  commence- 
ment to  the  place  where 
ill-health  began. 

There  is  little  in  climate 
as  an  actual  cure.  Re- 
move irritation  from  the 
throat  and  lungs  and  they 
cure  themselves.  Acquire 
a  store  of  vitality  and  build 
up  the  general  strength, 
and  to  do  so  go  to  a 
country  where  you  can  do 
it  best,  and  you  have  the 
whole  climatic  receipe,  per- 
haps. If  one  is  so  far 
gone  with  consumption 
that  all  he  can  do  is  to  sit 
in  a  chair  and  keep  up 
his  strength  with  tonics  until  the  climate  can  cure  him,  he  might 
perhaps  better  far  stay  at  home.  Many  a  sorrowful  pilgrimage  has 
been  uselessly  made  both  ways  because  of  this  mistake. 

If  the  invalid  realizes  in  time,  and  while  there  remains  sufficient 
strength  to  use  them,  that  the  actual  advantages  consist  in  the 
opportunity  to  be  out  of  doors  nine  days  in  ten,  and  often  every  day 
for  months  at  a  time,  where  cold  and  dampness  almost  do  not  exist, 
where  he  can  walk,  ride,  hunt,  farm,  drive  team,  trim  vines,  or  merely 
loaf  and  sit  in  the  sun,  and  can  make  up  his  mind  to  stay  at  least  a. 


AS   A   HEALTH    RESORT.  195 

year,  and  if  he  grows  better  to  stay  permanently,  at  any  price,  then 
it  is  likely  that  Southern  California  will  cure  him  if  there  be  a  place 
and  a  climate  that  can. 

The  country  has  begun  to  acquire  fame  as  a  good  place  for  women 
and  children.  Every  observing  visitor  is  impressed  by  the  sight  of 
the  youngsters  who  are  sensibly  turned  loose  by  their  ancestors,  and 
who  rolic  and  run  barefoot  in  the  most  bare-legged  and  unfashiona- 
ble fashion,  out  of  doors  the  livelong  day,  every  day  unless  it  rains, 
which  last  is  a  contingency  that  may  be  considered  when  it  comes. 
Women  belonging  to  the  numerous  but  aristocratic  sisterhood  that 
never  "  feels  well,"  seldom  smiles,  and  never  grows  fleshy,  are 
observed  to  "pick  up"  wonderfully  in  these  latitudes,  and  the 
feminine  countenance  seems  much  more  inclined  to  rosiness  and 
smiles  than  it  was  "back  east."  Men  engaged  in  the  actual  contest 
with  the  raw  wilderness,  or  worried  about  the  fluctuations  of  the 
real-estate  craze; — as  much  gambling  as  ever  lard-corner  or  wheat- 
deal  is;  —  do  not  look  differently  from  their  hard-worked  and  fretting 
brethren  the  world  over. 

That  California  is  a  very  curious  country,  is  a  fact  that  will  appear 
to  you  in  very  strong  colors  after  you  have  come  away  again.  You 
may  add  to  all  these  pages  tell  you,  certain  historical  recollections; 
the  immense  yield  of  the  precious  metals  in  her  earlier  history, — the 
days  when  all  those  who  knew  the  country  best  unanimously  declared 
that  it  was  "no  good  for  farming"; — the  profusion  and  quality  of 
her  present  products;  the  energy  and  genius  of  her  people;  the 
princely  endowment  of  her  Lick  Observatory,  and  of  her  schools, 
colleges,  asylums,  institutes  and  organized  charities;  the  eloquence 
of  her  preachers  from  Starr  King  down  to  Kalloch;  her  authors, 
statesmen  and  soldiers;  her  renowned  courts  of  law,  whose  decisions 
are  quoted  in  every  Saxon  court;  her  beautiful  women  and  happy 
children;  her  tolerance,  her  anti-Puritan  wickedness,  and  her  famous, 
whole-hearted  and  prodigal  hospitality.  You  may  also  remember 
the  fateful  days  of  the  Vigilantes,  and  the  chaos  out  of  which  all 


196 


OVERLAND  GUIDE. 


this  order  sprung,  and  recall  the  latest  stories  of  her  millionaire 
fools,  the  desperate  games  of  her  female  adventurers,  and  the  un- 
blushing perjuries  of  her  divorce  trials.  She  must  present,  notwith- 
standing, the  largest  progress  ever  made  in  thirty-six  brief  years  in 
the  whole  history  of  the  human  race;  the  most  favored  land  over 
which  the  standard  of  any  country  ever  floated. 


THE     I  M>. 


0PPENDIX. 


NOTE.— The  journey  here  briefly  sketched  may  not  occupy  quite  the  time  stated, 
the  incidents  remaining  the  same.  Also,  the  eastern  terminus  of  the  Santa  F6 
Route  is  now  Chicago.  The  interest  to  the  Western  Tourist  making  the  journey  for 
the  first  time  being  usually  from  Kansas  City  westward,  only  that  portion  of  the 

journey  is  given. 

ITINERARY. 

MONDAY  :  Leaving  Kansas  City  in  the  morning,  arrive  in  the 
evening  at  NEWTON,  Middle  Kansas, — SUPPER.  During  the  night 
the  journey  lies  westward  along  the  Arkansas  River, — first  seen 
at  Hutchinson,  Kan., — across  what  were  once  known  as  "  The 
Plains,"  to  and  across  the  western  line  of  Kansas,  to  LA  JUNTA, 
COLORADO.  BREAKFAST,  Tuesday  morning. 

From  La  Junta  the  coaches  and  Pullmans  going  direct  to  the 
Pacific  coast  turn  south-westward  ; — those  for  Denver,  or  Colorado 
Springs  and  a  junction  there  with  the  Colorado  Midland  Railroad 
or  the  Denver  &  Rio  Grande  Railroad,  going  northward.  During 
the  forenoon  TRINIDAD,  at  the  foot  of  the  Raton  Range,  is  passed, 
and  the  train  climbs  the  eastern  slope  and  passes  through  Raton 
tunnel.  DINNER  at  the  town  of  Raton.  SUPPER  at  the  town  of 
LAS  VEGAS,  whence  a  branch  line  of  six  miles  runs  to  the  LAS  VEGAS 
HOT  SPRINGS.  Beyond  Las  Vegas  is  passed  the  Glorieta  Range, 
and  immediately  beyond  this  is  the  station  of  LAMY,  whence  a  branch 
line  of  17  miles  goes  up  to  the  city  of  SANTA  FK. 

During  the  night  of  Tuesday,  the  train  enters  the  Valley  of  the 
Rio  GRANDE,  passing  down  this  valley  as  far  as  ALBUQUERQUE, 
where  the  Pacific  coast  cars  turn  westward  over  the  Atlantic  & 
Pacific  Railroad. 

Passengers  for  El  Paso,  or  the  interior  or  City  of  Mexico,  are 
carried  southward  from  Albuquerque. 

(197) 


198  APPENDIX. 

WEDNESDAY:  Breakfast  at  COOLIDGE,  near  the  western  line  of 
New  Mexico.  During  the  forenoon  pass  LAC; UNA,  Fort  Wingate, 
etc.,  and  fairly  enter  the  curious  country  in  which  there  is  so  little, 
and  yet  so  much,  to  interest.  DINNER  at  HOLBROOK  or  WINSLOW. 

During  the  afternoon  pass  Canyon  Diablo,  and  enter  the  forest 
region  about  Flagstaff.  SUPPER  at  WILLIAMS.  During  the  night 
pass  some  of  the  finest  mountain  scenery  possible  to  American 
travel  ;  about  midnight  reach  Peach  Springs,  the  nearest  railroad 
station  to  the  GRAND  CANYON,  which  lies  directly  north  ;  and  strike 
the  cown  grade  to  the  Colorado  River. 

THURSDAY:  Breakfast  at  THE  NEEDLES,  California,  at  the  western 
end  of  the  bridge  crossing  the  Colorado. 

Here  begins  THE  DESERT,  to  many  travellers  not  the  least  interest- 
ing portion  of  the  journey.  DINNKR  at  a  station  reached  about  one 
o'clock,  and  at  about  three  o'clock  p.  m.  arrive  at  BARSTOW,  where 
cars  for  Los  ANGELES,  SAN  DIEGO  and  all  points  in  Southern  Cali- 
fornia turn  southward  to  cross  the  San  Bernardino  Range  through 
Cajon  Pass.  SUPPER,  SAN  BERV  or  Los  ANGELES.  At  San 

Bernardino  the  cars  for  Los  Angeles  turn  westward  through  the  San 
Bernardino  Valley;  those  for  San  Diego  direct  go  southward.  To 
Los  Angeles,  the  journey  (supposing  it  to  begin  on  Monday)  ends 
on  Thursday  evening;  to  San  Diego  on  Friday  morning;  to  San 
Francisco  direct,  not  turning  off  at  Barstow,  on  Friday  morning. 

The  distance  from  Kansas  City  is:  to  San  Bernardino,  1,740  miles. 
To  Los  Angeles,  1,800  miles.  To  San  Diego,  1,871  miles.  To 
San  Francisco  (di»ect),  2,115  miles. 


N.  B.  The  time-tables  of  all  principal  Lines  are  usually  issued  at  the 
beginning  of  every  calendar  month.  They  show  the  frequent  changes  in 
details  of  time  and  train  service,  and  the  latest  should  be  consulted. 
Mileage,  scenery  and  territory,  and  usually  gross  time  required,  do  not 
change,  and  a  Guide  is  supplementary  to  the  technicalities  of  the  usual 
"folder." 


SPANISH 

&E0GRAPHICAL    FlAMES. 


NOTE. — Many  of  the  geographical  names  of  California  and  the  South-west  are 
Indian,  or  Indian  corruptions.  There  is  no  definite  authority  upon  pronunciation 
01  nu-aning,  and  no  attempt  has  been  made  to  give  them.  On  the  other  hand  many 
of  the  Spanish  names  are  mis-spelled  on  the  maps,  often  t6  the  extent  that  it  is  not 
possible  to  trace  their  original  significance.  Some  of  them  are  abbreviations  by  ear, 
Others  have  been  given  by  Americans  for  sound  only,  and  are  composites  of  two 
words  not  capable  of  being  joined  in  meaning.  Others  have  a  meaning  not  com- 
plimentary to  the  place,  or  ridiculous,  or  that  belongs  to  the  colloquialisms  of  a 
tongue  richer  in  proverbs,  plays  upon  words  and  double  meanings,  than  any  other. 
Others,  having  or  ginally  been  given  more  than  two  centuries  ago,  are  to  the  modern 
Spanish  vocabulary  what  old  English  would  be  to  ours,  and  their  meaning  is  doubt- 
ful. There  is  a  very  trivial  meaning,  without  significance  or  value,  attached  to  many 
of  these  geographical  names.  In  such  cases  the  pronunciation  is  the  chief  thing  of 
value.  Spanish  scholars  will  observe  that  in  words  beginning  with  "c"  or  "ch," 
etc.,  the  pronunciation  prescribed  by  the  Spanish  Academy  has  not  been  adhered 
to.  In  many  parts  of  Spain,  and  in  all  parts  of  Spanish  America,  the  lisp  which  is 
so  piquant  when  used  by  a  Madrid  orange-girl  is  considered  rather  an  affectation, 
and  "ch"  is  pronounced  as  in  our  word  "church,"  and  not  like,  or  nearly  like, 
"th"  in  "thus."  The  sound  of  "11";  like  that  of  those  letters  in  our  word 
"million,"  is  adhered  to,  their  elimination  being  in  all  cases  a  provincialism. 
Persons  unaccustomed  to  Spanish  pronunciation  should  remember  amid  the  Sans 
and  Santas,  and  "ahs"  generally,  that  the  "a"  is  in  all  words  as  it  is  in  our  "man" 
or  "sand,"  and  the  "aw"  sound  should  not  be  given  it.  "  O,"  occurring  often  in 
such  words  as  "los"; — "the,"  is  the  same  as  las,  except  that  it  is  masculine,  and 
the  "  o"  is  pronounced  as  in  our  word  "  ore";  thus  "los"  does  not  become  "loss," 
but  is  pronounced  "lose."  The  Spanish  "z"  is  practically  our  " s. "  The  pro- 
nunciations given  below  the  word  are  in  all  cases  as  near  an  approximation  as 
p  ssible,  though  perhaps  not  always  absolute  and  exact,  since  in  our  peculiar  and 
wonderful  mother-tongue  the  same  plain  word,  plainly  spelled,  may  be  pronounced 
in  three  or  four  ways,  by  the  same  number  of  persons,  in  the  same  conversation. 

(199). 


200  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

ADONDE  ................  Where  to. 


AGUA  CALIENTE..  .    ......  Hot  water. 

A/i-gua.  Cal-e-a/'#-tay. 
ALAMEDA  ...............  Lit.  a  grove  of  poplars;  a  shaded  walk. 


ALAMILLO  ..............  A  place  of  poplars. 


ALBUQUERQUE  ...........  A  family  name. 

^/-boo-ker-kay. 
ALCATRAZ  ..............  Pelican. 

A/-cat-ras. 
ALGODONES  ............  Lit.  cottons;  cotton  lands. 

Al-go-dfo-nais. 
ALISO  ..................  Alder-bush. 

Al-^-so. 
ALMADEN  ...............  A  place  of  mineral  deposits.     The  word 

Al-mah-</<7///.  is  not  in  common  use. 

ALTURAS  ................  Heights. 

Al-ta?-ras. 
ALVARADO  ..............  A    launching    place    for   ships:    not   in 

Alvar-rt//-do.  common  use. 

A  i  vise  ..................  A  view;  not  in  common  use. 

Al-r<r-so. 
AM  ADOR  ................  Lover. 


ARENA  .................  Sand. 

Ah-r0y-nah. 
ARROYO,  OR  ARROYO  SECO.  A  wash  made  by  water;   not  a  creek  or 

Ar-r0-yo  6V7)'-co  river,  and  shallower  and  smaller  than 

a  canyon. 

AZUSA  ...............    .  .  .  A  provocation;    annoyance.     The  word 

Ah-tt?<?-sah  is  colloquial. 

BALLONA  ..............  If   spelled  Ball/na  (bal-j^-nah)  it  would 

ah.  mean  whale. 


SPANISH   GEOGRAPHICAL   NAMES.  201 

BELEN A  seige  and  capture  for  which  the  Spanish 

Hay -lain.  histories  claim  great  glory. 

BELLA  VISTA Pretty  View. 

Batf-ya,  Vees-tah. 
BENICIA Should  be  Venecia;  Venice. 

Ben-<?<?-shah. 
BERNAL Proper  name. 

Ber-«0/. 
BERNALILLO Little  Bernal. 

Ber-nal-^/-yo. 

BERROS,  Los Name  of  a  plant,  Berro;  water-cress. 

Hay-rose. 
BUENAVENTURA Good    fortune;    also   a   frequent  proper 

•Z?'wtf/>*-ah-vain-/00-rah.        name. 

BUENA  VISTA Good  View;  does  not  mean   "beautiful  " 

l?wain-a\\  f^ees-tah.  view,  but  one  unobstructed. 

CAJON Caja,  a  box;  cajon,  a  big  box,  Cajon  Pass, 

Cah-/i0/ie.  "  box  pass." 

CALAVERAS Plu.     The  rattlepates;    the  mad-caps,  or 

Cal-ah-z/tfy-ras  •     what  we  call  goings-on;  didoes.    Used 

modernly  only  in  this  sense. 

CANYON  DIABLO. 

CANYON The  Spanish  spelling  is  "canon, "and  pro- 
nounced can-on  by  persons  not  accus- 
tomed. The  Span,  pronunciation  is 
can-yone;  the  American  can-yon.  It 
means  the  bore  of  a  gun;  calibre;  a 
groove,  in  artillery,  the  gun  itself. 
As  used  ordinarily  it  means  a  ravine 
with"  steep  sides  between  hills  or 
mountains,  or  a  deep  crack  in  the 
earth.  CANYON  DIABLO;  (De-a^-blo,) 
Devil's  canyon,  Canyoncito;  (^<?-to,) 
Little  canyon. 

CANUTILLO A  place  of  small  rushes. 


202  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

CARMELITA  ............  Name  of  a  flower. 

CarmeW-tah. 

CASA  GRANDE  ...........  Big  House. 

Ca/i-sah  Gran-day. 

CARRIZO  ...............  A  kind  of  reed  grass. 

Can-ee-so. 

CERRO  GORDO  ...........  A  thick  ridge. 

Sair-ro  Gor-do. 

CERILLOS,  Los  ...........  Plu.  small  round  hills. 

Sair-^/-yose. 

CERITOS  ................  Little  ridges. 

Sair-^-tose. 

CHAVES  ................  A  family  name. 

C/ia/i-vais. 
CHICO  .................  Little. 

C/ie-co. 
CHINO  ................  A  Chinaman. 

Che  no. 

CIENEGA  .................  \   swamp. 

Se-a///-e-ga. 
CIMARRON  ...............  An  estray  ,  lost 

See-mah-rone. 
COLORADO  ..............  Red. 

Co-lo-r0//-do. 
CORDERO  ...............  A  lamb. 


CORONADO  ..............  A  family  name.     Lit.  "The  crowned." 


CORRAL  .................  A  pen;  an  out-door  enclosure. 

Cor-ra/. 
COSNINO  ................  Meaning  unknown. 


CUBERO  .................  A  cooper. 


SPANISH   GEOGRAPHICAL   NAMES.  203 

CUCAMONGA  ............  If  this  word  were  spelled  with  a  "  j  "  in 

Ku-cah-mon-ga.  the  place  of  the  "  g,"  the  word  would 

mean  an  uncomplimentary  reflection 
on  a  nun. 
DE  Luz  ................  Lit.  of  light. 

Day  Loos. 
DEL  MAR  ...............  Of  the  sea. 

Dail  Mar. 
DESCANSO  ...............  Rest. 


Dos  CABEZAS  ............  Two  heads. 

Dose  Cah-&y-sas. 
Dos  PALMAS  ...........  Two  palms. 

Dose  /*#///-  mas. 
Dos  VALLES  .............  Two  valleys. 

Dose  JW-yais. 
ELDORADO  ..............  The  golden;    in  modern  use  "  dorado  " 

Ail  Do-m/i-do.  means  gilt,  washed,  plated. 

ELOTA  ..................  Meaning  not  known. 

Ail-0-tah. 
EL  MOLING  .........  ....  The  mill. 

Ail  Mo-/<?^-no. 
EL  MONTE  ..........  .....  The  wood. 

Ail  J/0/*-tay. 
EL  PASO  ................  The  pass.  —  Del  Norte  (Dail  Nortz.)    The 

Ail  Pah-so  pass  of  the  North. 

EL  RITO  ................  The  rite;  the  ceremony. 

Ail  Ree-\.v. 
ENCINITAS   ..........  Little  oaks.     The  name  also  expresses  a 

Ain-say-w^-tas  variety  of  the  oak. 

ESPERANZA  .............  Hope. 

Ais-per-tf^-sa. 
ESTRELLA  ........  .......  A  star. 

Ais-/AYM'/-yah. 
FARRALLONES  ....  .......  Plu.  Small  peaked  islands  rising  out   of 

Fair-al-,y0-nais.  the  sea.     Farol  (Fah-r^),  a  beacon. 


204  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

FRESNO  .................  Ash  tree. 

J^rais-no. 

GALLINAS  ...............  Plu.  Hens. 

Gal-j<f-nas. 

Garcia  ..................  A  family  name;  the  Spanish  equivalent  of 

Gar-f^-ah.  Smith  or  Jones. 

GARROTE  .....    .........  The  Spanish  instrument  for  capital  pun- 

Gar-r<7-tay.  ishment. 

GARVANZO  ..............  Provincial  Sp.  A  pea;  pea-vine  or  bloom. 

Gar-z'a//-so. 

GAVILAX  ................  A  hawk. 

Gah-ve-/<7//. 

GAVIOTA  ................  A  sea-gull. 

Gah-ve-<?-tah. 

GOLETA  ____    ...........  A  schooner. 

Go-lay-  tah. 
GRACIOSA  ...............  Kind. 

Grah-se-0-sah. 

GRANADA  ..............  A    pomegranate;     renowned;     powerful; 

Gran-<z//-dah.  fruitful. 

HERMOSILLO  ............  Little   beauty.      Hermosa    (Air-wo-sah), 

\\r-mo-seel-yo.  beautiful. 

HORNITOS  ..............  Little  ovens;  Homo  ((9r.no),  an  oven. 

Or-w^-tose. 
HUALPAI  ................ 


ISLETA  .........  .  .......  Little  island.     Isla  (£ees-\ah),  an  island. 

Ees-/ay.tah. 
INDIO  ..................  Indian. 


JICARILLO  ...............  Should  be  spelled  J0carillo;  a  braggart, 

Hic-ah-r^/-yo.  a  boaster. 

JIMENEZ  ...............  A  family  name. 

He-w^y-nais. 


SPANISH   GEOGRAPHICAL   NAMES.  205 

JORNADA  ...............  A   journey;    Jornada   del    Muerto    (dail 

Hor-na/i-dah.  ATuer-to),  journey  of  death. 

LAS  ANIMAS  .............  Plu.     The  souls. 

Lahs  W/j-ne-mas. 

LA  CANADA  .............  The  Glen;  a  vale  between  hills. 

Lah 


LAS  CASITAS  ...........  Plu.     The  little  houses. 

Lahs  Cah-^-tas. 

LAS  CRUCES  .............  The  Crosses. 

Lahs  Ow-sais. 

LACUNA  ................  A  lake. 

Lah-^^-nah. 

LA  JOYA  .................  The  jewel. 

Lah  /fo-yah. 

LA  PANZA  ..............  The   paunch  ;     the   suggestive    name    of 

Lah  Pan-sah.  Don  Quixote's  esquire. 

LA  PUNT  A  .............  The  point. 

Lah  /W/-tah. 

LAS  FLORES  .............  The  Flowers. 

Lahs  F 


LA  JUNTA  ..............  The  Junction. 

Lah 


LAS  VEGAS  ..............  The  Meadows. 

Lahs  Ftfy-gas. 

LERDO  ..................  Dull  ;  obtuse;  thick-headed. 

Lehr-<\Q. 

LINDA  ..................  Pretty. 


LOBOS  ..................  Plu.  Wolves. 

Z<?-bose. 

Los  ALAMOS  .............  pju.  The  poplars. 

Lose  ^/-ah-mose. 


206  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

Los  ANGELES  ............  Plu.     The   Angels.     The   name   of    this 

Los  An-hel-ais.  city  has  locally  two  or  three  pronun- 

ciations, none  of  them  the  Spanish. 
The  original  name  was  Nuestra 
Sefiorij,  Reitia  de  Los  Angeles.  The 
meaning  generally  given  ;  "  City  of 
the  Angels,"  is  imaginative. 

Los  BERROS  .........  ....  Plu.     The  water-cresses. 

Lose  £ay-TOse. 
Los  CUEROS  ............  Plu.     The  hides. 

Lose  Quer-ose. 
LOSGATOS  ..............  Plu.     The  cats. 

Lose  G^-tose. 
Los  LOMOS  ..............  Plu.     The  hills. 

Lose  Z^-mose. 
Los  LUNAS  ..............  The  Moons;  Luna,  the  moon,  is  feminine, 

Lose  Z^-nas.  and  if  this  name  did  not  express  the 

name  of  a  place  that  is  the  residence 
of  the  Luna  family  it  would  be  Las 
Lunas. 

Los  MEDANOS  ...........  Plu.  Sand-banks  on  the  sea-shore. 

Lose  May-</<wi-os. 
Los  NIETOS  .............  Plu.  The  grandchildren. 

Lose  Nee-0-tos. 
Los  ROBLES  ............  The  oaks. 

Lose  ^<?-blais. 
MADERA  ................  Wood  ;   general  term. 

Mah-aky-rah. 
MADRON,  madrono  .......  A  kind  of  tree. 


MAXITOU  ...............  Indian  ;  a  name  for  the  Supreme  Power. 

Man-ay-to. 
MANUELITO  ..............  Little  Emanuel. 

Man-wale-^-to. 
MANZANITO  .............  Lit.  Little  apple.     A  California  shrub. 

Man-zahn-<?-to. 


SPANISH   GEOGRAPHICAL   NAMES.  207 


M  ARIPOSA  ...............  Butterfly. 

Mah-re-/#-sah. 

MENDOCINO  .............  Lit.    A  little  liar. 

Men-do-^-no. 
MERCED  ................  Mercy. 


MESILLA  ...............  Little  flat-topped  hill.    Mesa  (May-sah), 

blay-seet-yah.  from  the  Spanish  word  meaning  a  table, 

is  the  name  of  this  peculiarly  shaped 
hill  throughout  the  south-west. 

MESQUITE  ........  .  ......  A  shrub  of    the   acacia   family  growing 

Mes-/Cw/.  extensively    over   the    whole    South- 

west and  Mexico. 

MILPITAS  ...............  Lit.  A  thousand  whistles. 

Meel-/>tas. 

MODESTO  ----  -.  ..........  Modest. 


MONTE  DIABLO  ..........  Devil  Mountain. 

Man-lay  Dee-a^-blo. 

MONTECITO  .............  Little  Mountain. 


MONTEREY  ..............  King's  Mountain. 


MONTOYAH  ..............  Meaning  not  known. 

Mon-/0>>-ah. 
MORENA  ................  Brown. 

Mo-ray-na. 

NACIMIENTO  .............  Lit.  A  birth.     More  especially  applied  to 

Nah-se-me-0/Vz-to  the  Nativity. 

N'AVAJO  .................  Name  of  an  Indian  tribe. 


NOGALES  ................  Plu.  Walnut-trees. 


OLLITA  .................  A  little  water-jar.     Sometimes  spelled  on 

Ole-j^-tah.  maps"Oleta." 

14 


208  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

OXAVA  .................  Meaning  not  known. 

O-naA-vah. 

ORO  GRANDE  ............  Lit.  Big  gold. 


ORTIZ  ..................  A  family  name. 

Or-tees. 
OTERO  .................  A  family  name. 

O-/tf)--ro. 
PACHECO  ................  A    family   name.     Lit.   a   harmless   little 

Pah-f//0j'-co  fellow. 

PAJARO  ................  A  bird;  general  term. 

/^-hah-ro. 
PALA  ...................  A  wooden  shovel. 

Pah-lab. 

PASADENA  ..............  A  Spanish  phrase  pronounced  "  Pah-so- 

Pas-atWtfy-nah.  deh-^/W//  "     would     mean     "Gate    of 

Eden  "  poetically.  Many  Spanish 
words  have  been  contracted,  wrongly 
spelled,  mispronounced  and  misunder 
stood  as  badly  or  worse  than  this,  sup- 
posing this  to  be  the  real  meaning  of  a 
name  very  probably  first  used  by  the 
California  padres,  and  afterwards  mis- 
pronounced, by  ear,  by  the  Americans. 

PASO  ROBLES  ...........  Oak  Pass. 

Pa/i-so  yfo-blais. 
PECOS  ............    .....  Freckles. 

7'dT-cose. 

RO  ..............  A  fishing-place. 

J  \iis-ca\\-day-ro. 
PICACHO  ..............  Peak. 


PIEDRA  GRANDE  .........  Big  rock. 

Pe-0-drah   Gran-day. 
PINIVETA  ...........  :.  .  .  A  variety  of  the  pine;  veined  or  fat  pine. 

/V-nah-rvzy-tah. 


SPANISH   GEOGRAPHICAL   NAMES.  209 

PINOLE  ................  Parched   corn,    ground    and  mixed   with 

Pe-//<?-lay.  sugar  and  water  as  a  drink,  or  used  as 

food.      The  gofio  of    South  America 
and  West  Indies. 

Pix<  >x  ..................  A  species  of  nut-bearing  pine. 


PLACER  .................  The  place  near  a  stream  where  free  gold 

Play-satr.  is  found.     Lit.  pleasure. 

PLUMAS  .....  .  ...........  Feathers. 

/V^-mas. 

PONCHO  .................  A  cloak  like  a  square  or  round  blanket 

Pone-c\\o.  with  a  slit  in  the  centre  for  the  head 

to  pass  through. 

POTRERO  ................  Lit.    a    place    for    raising    colts;    usually 

Po-tray-ro.  meaning  a  small  stock-farm. 

PRESIDIO  ......  .  .........  A  garrison  of  soldiers;  a  penitentiary. 

I'ray-.Kv-de-o. 

PUENTI  ..................  \  point  of  land. 

P'wain-tay. 

Pri.kco  .................  A  pijr;  dirty,  soiled,  filthy. 

JP'wer-co. 

RANCHO,  RANCHITA,  etc.  .Our  very  common  western  word  "ranch  " 

is  in  Spanish  a  mess,  as  of  soldiers, 
sailors,  hunters.  Any  place  where 
there  are  buildings  for  shelter  in  the 
open  country  would  be  called  a  rancho. 

RATON  ..................  A  mouse.     This  is  a  case  where  the  usual 

Rah-/Vw<?  Spanish  augmentative  termination  is 

reversed  in  meaning.     Rata  (ra/i- 
means  a  rat. 
Rio,      Rio     VISTA,      Rio 

GRANDE,  etc  .......  A  river,  river-view,  big  river. 

Re~ohVc€S-\ay\  Gran-da.y. 

ROMERO  ............    ...  A  family  name. 


210  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

ROSARIO  ................  A  rosary. 


SACRAMI  NT<>  ............  A  sacrament. 

Sah-crah-wa/w-to. 

SALIN  \  s  ........  ........  Places  of  salt. 

Sal-<r-nas. 
SAN  ANDREAS  ...........  San  Andreas. 

.\nd-rais. 
SAN  AN  TONIO  ...........  St.  Anthony. 


SAN  BERNARDINO  ........  St.  Bernard. 

Ber-nard-<r-no. 
SAN   DIM  AS  ...........  .  .  .  St.  Demas. 

De-was. 
SAN  DIEGO  .............  St.  James. 

De-0-go. 

rrro  ..........  Little  St.  James. 

a-gr-to. 

.......  St.  Ferdinand. 

SAN  CiAiiKiKi  ......  (iabriel. 

:>-  re  -<///. 
SAN  GORCONIO. 

(jor-goti' 
SAN  J.U-INTM  ...........  ith. 


.............  St.  Joseph. 

Ho- 

\\  ...............  St.  John. 


1  IAN  CAPISTKANO.  .  .St.  John  the   chanter,  as   nearly  as   the 
G7//-pees-/ra//-o.  meaning  can  be  rendered. 

!o\(ji  IN  ............  San  Joaquin. 


SAN  M  AKI-IAI  ............  St.  Martial. 


SPANISH   GEOGRAPHICAL   NAMES.  211 


SAN  MATEO  .............  St.  Matthew. 

Mat-tf-o. 
SAN  MIGUEL  ............  St.  Michael. 

Me  -£•#//. 
SAN  PABLO  ..............  St.  Paul. 

/W/-blo. 
SAN  PASCUAL  ............  Holy  Easter. 

Pas  -qua  I. 
SAN  PEDRO  ..............  St.  Peter. 

Pay-dru. 
SAN  RAFAEL   ...........  St.  Raphael. 


SAN  TOM-CIS  .............  St.  Thomas. 

SANTA  ANA;  ANITA  ......  St.  Ann;  or  Little  St.  Ann,  pronounced 

A/i-nah.     An-«^-tah.  San/W#ah,  one  word. 

SANTA  BARBARA  .........  St.  Barbara. 

SANTA  CATALINA  ........  St.  Catherine. 

Cat-ah-/^-nah. 
SANTA  CLARA  ..........  St.  Clara. 

SANTA  CRUZ  ............  Holy  Cross. 

Croos. 
SANTA  FE  ...............  Holy  Faith. 

Fay. 
SANTA  MONICA  ..........  St.  Monica. 


SAPINERO  ...............  Sapino,  a  kind  of  pine  ;  a  grove  of  such. 

Sah-pe-/;0y-ro. 
SAUCILITO   .............  A  little  willow. 

Sow-se-/<?-to. 
SEPULVIDA  .............. 


SIERRA  MADRE  ..........  Mother  Range. 

Se-0/0-rah  Mad-ray. 
SOBRANTE  ...............  Rich;  wealthy;  surplus;  overflow. 


•21'2  OVERLAND  GUIDE. 

SocoRR'  »  ................  Succor;  relief. 

So-^-ro. 
SOLEDAD  ................  Solitude;  lonesomeness. 


SOLANA  .................  A  sunny  place;  sunshine. 

So-/«//-na. 
SUPAI  ................... 


TAMALPAIS  ..............  The  country  of  tamales.     The  tamal  is  a 

Tam-al-y^-ees.  bit  of  Mexican  cookery. 

TECALOTE  ............... 

Tay-cal-0-tay. 
TEMF.CULA  ............. 

.  -w<v-oo-Iah. 

\  >:iark. 


TIA  it  \N  \  ...............  Tia  Juana;  aunt  Jane. 

//tf-na;  one  word. 

TIMPAS  ................ 

Te  em  -pahs. 
TRINIDAD  ...............  The  Trinity. 

Tre-ae-Art 

TL  ;  ...............  A  place  of  rushes. 


VAC  ..........  i  cow.     Cowville. 


VALLEJO  ...............  A  little  valley. 

Val-A/v-ho. 
VARA  ..................  Spanish  yard  measure;  a  wand,  a  switch. 

Var-zh. 

YOSEMITE  ..............  Said  to  mean  a  large  grizzly  bear. 


YSIDORA  ____  ............  Isadore;  a  woman's  name. 

Ee-se-</<?-rah. 


FAIRBANKS9 

STANDARD  SCALES 

FOR    ALL    PURPOSES, 
Guaranteed,    Correct,    Durable. 


PC  LI  PS  E  U/IND  MILLS 

L_  ARE  If       TH  E         III      BEST. 

WATER  TANKS 

—  FOR  — 

FARM  AND  ALL  OTHER  USES. 


WESTI  NGHOUSE 

STANDARD    AND    JUNIOR 

AUTOMATIC  ENGINES, 

FEED-WATER 
HEATERS. 


BOILERS. 

PUMPS. 


STIEA_:M: 

WHSTID 


CATALOGUES     FREE, 


FAIRBANKS  ft  CO. 

DENVER.       -       ST.  LOUIS. 


GRANTVILLE,  CALIFORNIA. 


THE  O.  A.  R.  SOLDIERS'  HOME, 

Is  the  only  place  we  know  of  where  a  small  investment 
is  sure  to  pay.  The  erection  of  a  beautiful  building, 
with  capacity  for,  say  500  Veterans,  with  beautiful 
grounds  covered  with  the  flowers  and  fruits  of  the  trop- 
ics— all  this  in  the  finest  climate  the  sun  ever  shone 
on.  Neither  heat  nor  cold  ;  no  malaria.  Life  becomes 
a  pleasure,  and  grief  vanishes. 

Lots  in  Grantville  can  be  had  for  $125  ;  $25.00  cash, 
$25.00  in  three  months,  $25.00  in  six  months,  $25.00 
in  nine  months,  $25.00  in  twelve  months.  No  interest. 

Call  on,  or  address 

W.  H.  HOLABIRD  &  CO., 

DIEGO, 


:i  or  not  to  sell ; 
That  I*  the  quest  i 
Whether  it  ir.  letter  to  sell  the  lota 
And  take  the  risk  of  three  payments 
Or  to  make  sure  of  what  i-  in  possession 
And  by  declining  hold  them. 
To  sell ;  to  risk  ;  perchance  to  loae  : 
Aye.  ill'- 

For  when  the  lota  are  gone 
What  charm  can  win  them  back 
From  fortunate  holders  ? 


CREDIXS. 

Will  bills  be  paid  when  due, 

Or  will  the  time   *trvtrh   out  till   orack  of 

doom* 

What  of*--  .vhat  of  relatire*. 

What  of  undes,  aunt.-,  and  mother  in-law 
With  |  :i,-y; 

What  of  exemptions,  bill  of  sale,  and  the 

compromise 
That  coolly  offers  a  dime  In  the  dollar, 

;  the  real  estate  dealer's  commissions,. 
That  eat  up  even  this  poor  pittance  ? 


Yet    sell  we  must, 
An.l   Kome  we'll   trust. 
"We  seek  the  just  ; 
For  wealth,  we  lust, 
By  some  we're  oust, 
>\n<l  stocks  -will  rust; 
But  we  skip  the   wust 
Or  we'd,  surely  bu.^t. 


W.  H.  HOLABIRD  &  CO 


Leading  Real  Estate  Dealers. 


SAN  DIEGO,  CALIFORNIA. 


